Bruce Kendall, president and CEO of the Economic Development Board for Tacoma-Pierce County and an advocate of adding a UWT law school, said the study found that the South Sound region could provide jobs for 69 new attorneys a year.Boing.
Unfortunately, the people of Washington have postponed new law school construction to fill this justice gap and give opportunity to Washington's minorities, females and oppressed "others" who need the power of a JD.
But in their short-sighted "maybe we'll fix this serious societal problem tomorrow" attitude, the plutocrats in Washington state have created opportunity.
If Tacoma is ripe for 69 new lawyers each year, it seems to me that new lawyers in other parts of the country would be wise to add Tacoma to the list of places (Alaska, Nebraska) where lawyer opportunities are super-excellent instead of merely excellent. Whereas the new JD in Oklahoma City may only have a million dollar premium, these new Washington lawyers likely have significantly higher premiums. Million-five? Two million? Three million? A million plus lottery-ca-ching punitive damages?
Remember, too, that this study is an economic estimate. More often than not, they hedge conservatively. I have no evidence for this, but do you have any counter-proof? No? Then I win. Preponderance of the evidence, dear reader. It could be that the Tacoma market is actually capable of supporting 75, 100, 200, 1000 new lawyers every year. We'll never know until we find out. Personally, I suspect Tacoma is just like New York, Boston, Washington DC, and Chicago: elastically capable of supporting far, far more lawyers than any small-minded, proscriptive writer would think.
So I say build a law school in Tacoma. But until then, let's flood it with transfers injected with that Horace Greeley spirit, to go west and prosper, show the anarchic natives the way of the Law, and profit profit profit. The Million Dollar Express is transcontinental, and cuts through the Rockies - nay, any obstacle - without issue or extra expense.
Sadly, lemmings might stumble on this article and think that they too can go to a fourth tier garbage pit, and make serious cash representing the poors.
ReplyDeleteIllinois has 9 law schools, 98,000 lawyers and billboards advertising $49.00 traffic court defense. I'm loading up the '05 LeSabre, renting a U-Haul and going to the big rock candy mountain of law practice opportunity. Do they have reciprocity? I'm tired of $37K a year...opportunity abounds in Tacoma!!!!
ReplyDeleteSince no law school for Tacoma, time to tap into resources available a mere 30 miles away in Seattle; per the ABA's inflated employment numbers, 55 graduates of the 2015 class of Seattle U were flat out unemployed, with another 19 from UWashington-so that's more than 69 attorneys-problem solved!
ReplyDeleteNo, no, no. You have misprinted and misread the conclusion of the feasibility study. I'm certain that the last part should read:
ReplyDelete"...the jobs that the South Sound region could provide for new attorneys is 69."
That is, there's no lawyering work so just enjoy yourself.
I mean, no credible feasibility study would blatantly and solely include the only numeral to have sexual connetations if there weren't some sort of hidden message contained therein. Otherwise, I could imagine a credible study would state that there would be a tolerence ("60 to 80 jobs") or a hedge ("about 70 jobs"). Here though, after thoroughly studying multiple factors and knowing that these job market variables will change over time (sometimes abruptly and significantly), the conclusion that there will definately be 69 (not 68 or 70) new jobs cannot simply be taken at face value. I think it may in fact be a wink to the other purveyors of the law school scam. A sort of "I'll scratch your back if you scratch mine" but a bit further south.
30 miles is simply too far to drive for a JD.
ReplyDeleteWith the internet, we can put a law school education on every monitor in every home-just click and be saved.