How a Poor kid becomes a Poor Law Student
Everyone knows going to Law School is a precarious financial decision. The legal field is oversaturated with lawyers and people often preach the mantra of “Top 14 or bust.”
But I want to let go of all of that for a second. It may be true. It may not be. I just want to talk about how Law School is in many ways designed for the wealthy from the start. How people who go to Law School to improve their earning potential, find themselves unable to gain the financial security they so desire. How a poor kid becomes a poor law student
It starts the summer before you were accepted to Law School. Did you know there are feeder programs that allow incoming law students of color the ability to work with top firms over the summer? I bet you didn’t. You see, if you’re not privy to these programs, then it could be a huge detriment to you later on. These programs not only allows you to be paid by a firm over the summer, but many firms place a preference on their feeder students when applying to 1L firm positions. What does this have to do with money, Raymond? Oh, no one told you? Law Firms can pay up to 40,000 dollars for a summer’s worth of work. That’s more than half a starting NYC teacher’s salary. The only issue is that 1L firm fellowships are incredibly competitive. They are made even more competitive by feeder programs, which essentially remove positions off the market before you even sit through your first lecture. Your odds of being poor throughout Law School just increased.
Housing is a dilemma. Law School housing can often be the most expensive option on campus. Of course there are other cheaper options, but sometimes the upfront cost makes them cost prohibitive in the short term. My refund check has not cleared yet, so I cannot afford to buy a bed and mattress. The furnished Law School Housing is looking far more attractive now. One might say get a credit card, but what if your funds never clear? It’s easier to tell a University to waive their late fee for their own negligence than it is to tell a credit card company you intended to pay the minimum, but your refund never came through. So you take on the more expensive housing and as a result more debt. And you become poorer.
Fast forward a few months, everyone is telling you about Law Firms and Fellowships now and that the only way to get them is by getting good grades. But how exactly do you do that? You will be inundated by a million “How to Survive 1L Year” tutorials, none of which give a complete story. Some of your classmates spend their summer in training camps that acclimate them to all the legal jargon and the basics of briefing and issue spotting. Your peers may just be doing a semester’s worth of review while you struggle. While students taking these programs are a rarity in many top institutions, rare is all you need when the curve is not very generous in regards to the amount of people who receive top grades. You will study furiously. You will get 2 B+s and an A-. Or 2 B+s and a B. Or all Bs. Point is your grades are not stellar. And that means firms are unlikely to call you. That’s unfortunate because it means you just became a lot poorer.
Oh, you want to work Public interest. That’s nice of you. But you want to make money too. Oh… do you intend to work at the ACLU or the NAACP? I doubt it. They do pay good salaries and as a result, they also expect you to get more than one A- last semester. The fellowships that exist to pay you are often tied to firms. The reality is these things are competitive. You needed to score higher the first time.
Public interest for one summer is no big deal. Wait, it’s unpaid. Oh fuck. Well if you go to a school that has the means, you may be paid an automatic stipend for the summer. It will barely let you get rent and other basic necessities, but in the end it’s all you’ve got. You take the stipend, clip some coupons and buckle in as you hope you can survive on almost no cash, while also being a functional worker at these programs. If you are not lucky enough to go to a school that funds this, then you may be completely priced out. What’s worse is these stipends tend to be funded by your financial aid award, so you essentially are making it impossible to afford your next year’s expenses. But you suck it up, take the money. And you may also find yourself becoming poorer.
We’re also forgetting the surprisingly large “small costs” of law school. You need suits to go to firm events, otherwise you will stick out in the worst kind of way. You can’t get them tailored initially, so you buy 80 dollar suits at Macy’s. But your overlapping sleeves and your way too big for you pants forces you to get your suits tailored. 15 dollars for the sleeves. 40 dollars for the suit tapering. 15 dollars for pants. Times this by two and you’re looking at 200 dollars of tailoring on top of the 160 dollars you paid for your suits. You’re attempting to look for the money in your bank account. But you can’t find it. You already paid for your 200 dollar casebooks. You spent a 100 dollars on hornbooks. And yet you’re still running short. So you cut corners the only way you know how. You stop buying so much food. You do laundry less frequently. Every little penny saving opportunity is not a mere act of frugality, it is your only lifeline. When we finally make it to the end of the month, you realize that you don’t have enough money to get your Mom a birthday gift or perhaps you can’t afford to keep paying your parents’ rent. Poor students are often stewards for their families. And they stare at their bank account and realize they just became a lot poorer.
And if you somehow fail to keep the facade up before your 2nd-year internship, then you will be criticized. You will be criticized by people who think you shouldn’t be in law school because you can’t afford it. You will be criticized by that one brilliant poor student who had straight As, had a full ride to the school and has a personal mentor footing half of their costs. When you’re wealthy, you can be mediocre, but when you’re poor, it’s unacceptable. You will be criticized by expert penny pinchers, who will mention you should have gotten the cheapest apartment and applied for these 50 scholarships and taken these deals on Target for underwear. All the while you are wondering how you have the time to be an expert at saving and a Law Student. At this point you aren’t poorer. You’re just poor.
I am not a poor Law Student (yet). I am blessed with so many opportunities and a family that can support me to an extent. But I know they exist. I know they are meandering through the halls of a Law School, wondering if they made the right choice. I know they stare at their casebooks so hard, believing that if they just read a little more and focused a little more, the Law would in some way provide a remedy to their own distress. But it doesn’t. And it never will because Law School wasn’t made to make poor kids more financially stable. Law School was made to turn poor kids into poor law students.
