Wednesday, January 25, 2017

Bringing Law School Jobs Back to Charlotte

The internet articles write themselves, filling the gaps like a LegalZoom form filing, the headline usually looking something like:

[Metro Area] Might Lose [Failed Business]? [Metro Area] Needs a New One!

This sort of economic atavism is, economically speaking, stupid.  Just as jobs in defunct industries just don't wang dang reappear like global commerce is a fucking magic trick, it's ridiculous to try and reinvigorate businesses where they obviously fail and rational economic actors have chosen to move elsewhere, purchase elsewhere, etc.  The Free Market is the Free Market, and if we're moving to government intervention forcing industries and jobs to exist against the order of the Free Market, we could do a heck of a lot better than...

WAIT!  What the fuck am I smoking?  I'm in Trump's America now, and that means we're bringing old jobs back. While most of the hubbub so far has been about metalworkers and light industry in the rust belt, I challenge the reader to ask why not law schools?

Indeed, why not bring lost law school jobs back before they've even left?

Charlotte's got the right idea.
Our city needs to have a law school. And with Charlotte School of Law on the ropes, it’s time to get going on starting a new one.
...
It’s a shame that the many Charlotte School of Law alums now working in the city’s legal community have had their degrees tarnished. But it’s important that future students like those can still attain their educational goals here in town.
Article pitches UNC-Charlotte law with an intriguing but less satisfying backup suggestion of relocating Wake Forest to Charlotte.

The article does not seem to be a parody.

4 comments:

  1. Note that the writer starts with the undefended claim "Our city needs to have a law school".

    Why? Because it's our city, damn it! Never mind whether it be Charlotte, Paducah, or East Bumblefuck. We need a mother-fucking law school!

    And since we certainly won't question that assumption (Amerika, love it or leave it!), the only issue is which law school. Do we demand that Charlotte be shored up with the public coffers? Do we urge Wake Forest, wherever the hell it is, to move into town? Do we demand that the University of North Carolina build a public law school in Charlotte from the ground up?

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  2. Oddball ideas, to be sure. But here's an even odder fantasy: did anyone realize there's still a law school at Campbell University?
    How about moving that one to Charlotte, since it serves no visible purpose in Mayberry?

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    Replies
    1. Mayberry too needs a law school. You don't expect Opie to have to leave home for his studies, do you?

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  3. When will NC State add a damn law school already?

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