The article is kind of dumb. How many people are actually choosing between firms like Wachtell/Cravath versus the 3rd tier firms that have been laying people off like Thacher Profit or Sonnenschein? Oh man, now that I see there's a recession, I guess I'll go work for Wachtel...oh also note to self, try to transfer from New York Law to Yale and be at the top of my class.

Joke city.
lies and lameness.

Some of the litigation boutiques are absolutely swamped with work and evidencing no signs of a hiring freeze, slowdown, salary cut, etc.

Uh, we got blackberries at my DC firm (a top Vault firm) in 2006.

2:42 - Some people turn down Cravath or S&C to work at a less prestigious firm that will treat them like a superstar, or that excels in a specific practice area.

That might become less common now though.

Ropes and Goodwin in DC also expanded their summer classes this cycle and cleaned up a bit.

Does this mean I have a shot at a biglaw firm as a 3L... this non profit stuff is not working out.

2:50 - But you are saving babies! The Harvard Law Review salutes you. Why would you want to go work for The Man?

2:52 - Because these baby loving hippies are driving me crazy with their inefficiency. Oh, and jet skis, I want to own jet skis.

2:47 - I'm an HYS grad who turned down top 5 firms to work for a top 20 firm that was strong in the practice area I wanted to focus on.

I am now a partner at my firm. A lot of my friends who went to top 5 firms got burned out on Big Law. They are no longer at their original firms (and some have left the law).

It makes sense that S&C could still hire all their summers. Space is plentiful when your attrition rate is among the highest in biglaw.

People go to V3 etc. because they can lateral out to a place with ease. V3 to V10. V10 to V 30. Or get the inhouse job maybe a year earlier. But really...
Look at Cravath's website. Look how many lawyers there are total. Now look at the 161 summers number again. Shelf life foshizzle.

I am a summer at a V100 firm that is doing everything that Cravath and S&C are doing. They have increased their summer class by a third. We all got an out of the box Blackberry, a brand new computer, full summer of shows, baseball, firm outings, dinners and lunches. Managing partner told us the firm is kicking ass. Oh and it also offers a quality of life.

3:10 - Firm name, please? Or some hints?

This isn't news; most of BigLaw is doing the same. And someone tell the idiot tipster that summer associates (in every firm I'm personally aware of) have been getting Blackberries for years.

3:10--Am Law #90

Everything in Houston is still cooking - loot at de price a dat black gold!

2:49:

I assume you meant to say that Ropes/Goodwin in Boston have expanded their summer programs (although they may have done so in DC as well).

Biglaw firms, at least in NYC, can do this because they trim from the midlevel ranks via stealth layoffs, often for trumped-up reasons.

These are not "super-eilte" firms. These are sweat shops that are looking for warm bodies to fill up slots. The best lawyers, believe it or not, do not go to these firms. You perpetuate this ridiculous notion that in order to be a real, serious lawyer, you need to work at some garbage firm like this. Are you a paid propogandist for these firms?

3:33 wishes he were one of those warm bodies

3.33 -- Where do the best lawyers go?

Guys in my high school used to perpetuate ridiculous notions about having to be a serious lawyer to work at garbage firms all the time. It was no big deal.

-Obligatory Frat Stud

"doom and gloom"
"a legal tabloid"
"hard core"
"hot"
"cooler"
"kinder and gentler"
"lifestyle-oriented"
"vote with their feet"

Damn, Lat--are you getting some kind of kickback from Scare Quotes Inc.?

Do you really have to be top of your class at Yale to go to Wachtell? Don't they have tiny summer classes?

3:38(a) and 3:38(b):

You are proving my point preceisly. You are so brainwashed--and the idea at working somewhere other than a firm like this is so foreign to you--that you

(a) fail to realize that many people including me--not necessarily rich trust-fund babies--can easily get jobs in these sweatshops, and have in fact been offerred such jobs, but have no interest in doing such boring work; and

(b) after three years of law school, and probably meeting hundreds of lawyers, you have no idea that the best law students do not go to these places.

Ropes has something like 172 summers nationwide this year.

[Insert PHJW Joke here]

"terrible economy"? wtf? Says who? Sure it's terrible if you work in the securitization area, but everyone else is doing just fine.

3:50,

Please,give us specific examples of where the best law students work immediately after law school.

4:15:

See Barack Obama

We're actually waiting for them to raise the meal budget here ($65 lunch/$80 dinner) at S&C. It would be nice to keep pace with the increasing price of food and inflation.

That's $60 for lunch, not $65. Now get back to your due dilligence.

3:50's law firm = TTT

This article doesn't report on anything that most lawyers and law students don't already know. S&C and CSW are flush with cash? You don't say.

many of the best law students go on to clerkships and government jobs, or to elite boutique firms like Robbins Russell, or Kellogg Huber, or Bartlit Beck, or Patterson Belknapp, etc

Sweatshops like the places named in this post, however, are for suckers.

I'm 3.33(b). Actually, to my knowledge, the "best" law students don't go in any one particular direction.

Some of the best law students from my school went to these places (i.e. Cravath, Skadden, etc). Others went to boutique litigation firms. Others went to the government. Some went to Legal Aid or other public service organizations. So making a blanket statement that "the best law students don't go to Cravath, etc" is ridiculous. Some of them do. Some of them don't. Give me a break.

3:42 -- I noticed the profusion of quotation marks too. Must be a gay thing.

There's no brainwashing here. I considered a full range of options but decided that because of my 1) debt and 2) desire to work on the most exciting cases, I would go to one of the big, reputable firms. What's wrong with that?

One way to figure out where the top students go besides firms like Cravath, would be to look at where the students who summered at Cravath/Wachtell end up when they decline the offer. Anyone know?
I'm guessing investment banks, top PI places and boutiques.

3:55 - PHJW actually has its largest summer associate class ever.

5:01, nothing.

I'm a summer at a branch office of Latham. We all got blackberries and laptops; we're going on a retreat to a five-diamond resort; they told us this won't be any different from any other summer and we all have offers waiting for us; and they reiterated the no-layoff promise. Life is good =D

5:06 - the people I know who did such a thing first went to clerk, then to either a competitive gov't office (i.e., OLC, Civil Apellate,etc.) or lit boutique for a few years, then applied for teaching fellowships/positions. Of course there are a few that simply go to a lower ranked firm or into public interest. Not sure what people with an interest in transactional work do, especially in this market.

The best line is: They also gave us Blackberries (not sure they normally do this).

Its cute how these kids are so excited to be grownups. Wait until they get slaughtered.

The hardest jobs to get are the highest paying ones and the lowest paying ones. That said, there are reasons for not going S&C/Cravath/Wachtell that are not related to going high prestige public interest/clerkship.

Cravath can talk about expanding all they want. With a summer class 33% of the size of your entire office, most of those people are dogmeat. And no, most of them don't realize that. Fortunately the brutal hours will take care of a lot of the attrition.

Some top students, believe it or not, actually pick firms based on partnership prospects, practice area, big fish/small pond and other considerations not related to going for the most elite name possible.

Cravath to 190 summer associates!

33% of the office is huge. That's disgustingly painful to think about 2-3 years in.

Milbank also made a promise that they would not alter their hiring policy.

What's the partner-associate ratio at Cravath and at S&C?

What firm is AmLaw #90?

5:51: in 2 to 3 years most will have left., just like the associates before them. The churn is rapid.

6:00: at Cravath it's still really low but this summer class was purposely intended to change that. The partners wanted more leverage to increase their PPP. There aren't going to be mass no-offerings.

Wow, 33% of the entire office. Assuming every one of them gets an offer and a normal yield, that is an enormous growth in workforce. I know firms like Cravath and S&C are doing well, but that is a lot of mouths to feed. Why set yourself up for having to scale back later by essentially making people quit? Each associate who leaves still costs a fair amount of money. Maybe they don't count on the downturn lasting all that long.

"They even gave us Blackberries" Huh? That's a good thing?

I love not having a Blackberry.

God, you people are boring. I'd rather talk about Lat's gay quotation marks.

Latham Blackberry/Laptop dude:

Did they put someone under your desk all summer too? That would really make me want to come back.

Cravath already makes its first year associates share offices (and sometimes the second years and more senior associates). After the summer, are they going to pack more associates per office or expand their floors? Or are they counting on attrition to do the trick.

I don't think Time Warner, Ogilvy or Roberts & Holland (tax boutique sandwiched between Cravath floors) are eager to move.

Hilarious how so many people think getting a Blackberry is a benefit

Also looking at a completely typical summer at my V100. Brand new blackberry and laptop, baseball games, concerts, lunches, golfiing, firm retreat, you name it. And a promise from the hiring partner that everyone was getting an offer (barring complete idiocy). Summer class isn't significantly larger though. This might even be nicer than last summer.

5:42- best comment

Take heed of 6:55's words. Blackberries suck. They're cool for the 4 hours you have it b/f the partners find out about it. After that, say goodbye to free time. Although with summers, that probably won't be the case. Unless you are unlucky enough to come across one of the jerks (unlikely since they usually keep those people far away from the summers).

"Also looking at a completely typical summer at my V100. Brand new blackberry and laptop, baseball games, concerts, lunches, golfiing, firm retreat, you name it. And a promise from the hiring partner that everyone was getting an offer (barring complete idiocy). Summer class isn't significantly larger though. This might even be nicer than last summer."

Is this a joke? If not, this has to be one of the most disgusting things I have ever read. Who the fuck in the real world cares that your firm is "V100"? Wow!! And what kind of sick, materialistic bastard are you. Please tell me that you are a normal person, and you you are just kidding

I'm working for a V10 and I can top you, Mr. Free Laptop and Free Blackberry. We have people who wipe our asses after we take s**** and we have free use of Eliot Spitzer quality whores all summer.

I'm not sure why getting a Blackberry is considered a good thing. I'm still a law student, but I have enough friends with real jobs who cringe every time that damn blackberry buzzes at 10 pm on Friday to know that being constantly accessible is NOT a good thing.

6:45--CSM renewed their lease some months back and increased their space by a couple of floors. It seems the firm had been planning on expanding well before the recent downturn and the-sky-is-falling sentiment among commenters here.

Plus, the whole office sharing thing is a sore subject as it is so I doubt they will be stuffing 3 associates into already -crowded 2-person offices.

10:04 - it's not just sentiment on here, for us in M&A (and not at one of the very top shops), the sky is falling.

Life in Houston is great. No set backs here at all. No outrageous cost of living. No state income tax.

Now if only the 'Stros were worth a crap.

Guys at my high school used to get brand new, out-of-the-box Blackberries all the time. It was no biggie.

desire to work on the most exciting cases, I would go to one of the big, reputable firms.

Stop drinking the Kool-Aid- you're convinced that the mind numbing paper shuffle you're doing is exciting.

While three Bway shows does seem like alot- most firms only do one, as far as i know- blackberries are standard.

My firm gave us brand new Curves, which was extra nice, but still- no firm is NOT giving its summers blackberries, as unnecessary as they are.

The "big" cases aren't the "most exciting" -- they're just doc review projects for your first few years and beyond (to a lesser extent). The "small" cases that the partners don't care about and give you full responsibility on -- now those are the ones that are truly "exciting".

FYI--CS&M has always had an office sharing policy for less than third-year associates. SO that's not news. They recently optioned a second floor at One Ropemaker in London and they have option rights for other floors in WWP. They have expanded significantly in WWP.

It would never be possible to cram three to an office except partner offices as Cravath has built-in furniture.

As a former Cravather, I am curious as to whether they can maintain "The Cravath Way" with so many newbies. But I also know that Cravath finds a way to put folks to work, and so there will likely be increased supervisory/delegating for midlevels, seniors and junior partners, but perhaps increased partnership chances as well as Cravath builds out practice groups it historically has not focused upon. Cravath was always very comfortable with the "we'll team up with another law firm that has a specialty practice" business model. It could be that they are planning to flesh out some of the groups like Environmental, Benefits and Tax or grow small/non-existent groups like Real Estate and Bankruptcy. Time will tell.

I hope that CS&M doesn't lose it's small firm feeling. I was always great to know that the firm wasn' t so big that you didn't know which partner just got out of rehab or which partner was asked to step down while he got his problem with escorts under control. Or which partner's kids' were back from Reform School. I loved that stuff. Almost made all of the booking cars from the 42nd floor Reception at 4am worth it. Almost.

I enjoy the posts that reek of insecurity. It seems that people who never in a million years could get a callback with Wachtell/Cravath/S&C are most likely to bash them. That's ok; whatever makes your mediocre firm appear like a choice rather than the inevitable result of your own mediocrity is fine with me.

And, let's put to rest the notion that new associates at Wachtell/Cravath/S&C spend all day (and night) working on due diligence or doc review. This just isn't true. I suppose it MIGHT happen in isolated circumstances, such as if you're the retard of the summer class (which would still make you more qualified that most posters attacking the firms at issue). If you go to a top firm and work hard you will get great work. People who have never walked inside of Wachtell, Cravath or S&C should spend less time speculating about what goes on there and more time writing their cookie-cutter insurance defense briefs for $50k per year.

This is BS. At one of the events, I was lucky enough to be in the company of a too-drunk partner that simply stated they got too many acceptances.

It is sad you dumbasses do not realize that the monster summer classes at MOST (not all) firms were put in place prior to the collapse of the credit/PE/M&A markets.

Given the billables at Wachtell/Cravath/S&C, I think it's safe to interpolate that most of these summers have no clue what they got themselves in for, and will be bloody miserable. With the exception of Wachtell, the pay difference, if any, between these firms and other market firms is negligable. And I'm not sure you could pay me enough short of partner comp to work Wachtell hours.

And yes, a summer class that is 33% of the entire firm is going to be slaughtered.

9:06PM- Let me get this straight. Lat posts about a possible flight to the two or three most profitable firms due to a fear the other biglaw firms are facing financial difficulties and will be making cuts to their summer programs.

Myself and others post about the apparent ongoing financial success of our reputable but otherwise unremarkable biglaw firms.

You call me a sick materialistic bastard and ask "who the fuck cares?"

Forgive me but I thought that might have been relevant information given that Lat expressly solicited such comments in his post. I'm sorry that talking about the financial success of my law firm, in context, was so offensive to you as to be laughable.

To sum up, yes I am a normal person. No i was not kidding. What is your problem?

To all the Blackberry haters, I disagree.

My V10 firm gave us fresh-out-of-the-box BB Curves. They are great. My I-Banking friends don't even get one!! Excited to use mine around town this weekend.

Re: 9:08. S&C does not have minimum billables... Really. That said, of course people work very hard here, but by no means only doing doc review/due diligence (or even more of that than at peer firms).

Thugz at my high school got sidekicks from theyz bosses all the time, ain't no thing but a chicken wing.

Spring Awakening sucked.

10:14 - Sure, but you're in bloody Texas.

No thanks.

No way.

Some of the people posting here have a very black and white way of looking at the world. Just because someone has chosen to live their life differently than you have does not necessarily make them a sucker. That outlook absolutely drives me crazy (but I can't help reading the comments anyway). What one person finds challenging, rewarding work may be boring as all get out to the next, and what drives one person crazy may not bother someone else at all.

That being said, there are some major misconceptions that have been stated above. I've worked at S&C and I know that you don't have to bill crazy hours in order to keep your job and be well respected. The key is to do good work on what you are staffed on, and to maintain a respectable number of hours a year (and in my experience around 2000 is fine). Also, a good portion of the transactional work actually is on complex, innovative structures. Of course there's some run of the mill securities work and every job has its boring administrative aspects, but you don't get pigeonholed into one thing and stuck doing only it unless you want to.

I'm sure that there are plenty of other firms with the same or similar aspects, and other firms or jobs that appeal to other people for perfectly legitimate reasons.

Lat, I think you're right. It may be hard to imagine for a guy at NYLS, but fellow students at my HYS school had very disparate preferences. Lots went into lower-ranked firms in secondary markets, and lots went into firms with a reputation for being humane even in primary markets (Latham, I'm looking at you!). After all this credit stuff hit and the layoffs and partner deequitizations started flowing, lots of my classmates too late started second-guessing their decisions. It seems totally conceivable that in such turbulent waters, more people would sign up for Skadden's iron warship than for a fluffier model of firm.

For what it's worth, I would still hate to be a summer in CSM's enormous class. But S&C, Simpson, Skadden, and particularly WLRK were likely much more attractive options to last year's 2L's than even one year earlier.

"Skadden's Iron Warship"

Jordan, that's your new band name.

9:06AM - I second that. We're SWAMPED with corporate summers and don't know what to do with them. We've been making up non-billable memos that no one will ever read to keep them busy (and they can see right through this...even the 1Ls). Lots of decisions being made of the do-I-keep-the-work-and-miss-hours-or-keep-summers-busy sort. You can imagine the way most of us are deciding. Last summer I was keeping summers busy left and right with stacks of due diligence, contract review charts, etc., and this summer I'm hoarding crap work like that as a mid-level in a futile attempt to make hours.

Not sure if this will help but here is a table from Columbia showing offwr/acceptances at NYC firms--I think the numbers are quite revealing--First number is offers, 2nd is acceptances 3rd is %
Cravath, Swaine & Moore LLP 66 29 43.94%
Davis Polk & Wardwell 48 18 37.50%
Cleary Gottlieb Steen & Hamilton 44 15 34.09%
Paul, Weiss, Rifkind & Garrison LLP 52 15 28.85%
Shearman & Sterling LLP 44 15 34.09%
Latham & Watkins LLP 41 13 31.71%
Gibson Dunn & Crutcher LLP 43 11 25.58%
Simpson Thacher & Bartlett LLP 59 11 18.64%
Milbank Tweed Hadley & McCloy LLP 35 8 22.86%
Willkie Farr & Gallagher 52 8 15.38%
Debevoise & Plimpton LLP 39 7 17.95%
Weil Gotshal & Manges LLP 30 7 23.33%
Sullivan & Cromwell LLP 40 6 15.00%
Dewey & LeBoeuf LLP 41 5 12.20%
Jones Day 15 5 33.33%
Kramer Levin Naftalis & Frankel LLP 12 5 41.67%
Orrick Herrington & Sutcliffe LLP 8 5 62.50%
Skadden, Arps, Slate, Meagher, & Flom 37 5 13.51%
Wachtell, Lipton, Rosen & Katz 6 5 83.33%
White & Case, LLP 31 5 16.13%
Chadbourne & Parke LLP 24 4 16.67%
Fried Frank Harris Shriver & Jacobson LLP 24 4 16.67%
Hughes Hubbard & Reed LLP 25 4 16.00%
Winston & Strawn 14 4 28.57%
Cahill Gordon & Reindel LLP 16 3 18.75%
DLA Piper US LLP 18 3 16.67%
Kirkland & Ellis LLP 6 3 50.00%
Linklaters LLP 9 3 33.33%
Morrison & Foerster LLP 15 3 20.00%
Proskauer Rose LLP 42 3 7.14%
Reed Smith LLP 3 3 100.00%
Sidley Austin LLP 31 3 9.68%
Allen & Overy 17 2 11.76%
Bracewell & Giuliani LLP 4 2 50.00%
Kirkland & Ellis LLP 22 2 9.09%
Quinn Emanuel Urquhart Oliver & Hedges, LLP 9 2 22.22%
Akin Gump Strauss Hauer & Feld LLP 16 1 6.25%

It seems that most people don't give much thought to long-term career prospects right out of law school. I worked at a top firm for the first 2 1/2 years out, and then I transferred to a respectable mid-size firm. It was a good move for me. I was very unlikely to make partner in my first job, and I think I have a very good shot at my current firm.

Most people are ignorant or unrealistic about their chances at making partner at a top firm. They don't understand that it is law school curve for the A's all over again, but with nothing but the top people and more arbitrary $@^% than you can imagine.

That said, most Gen Y's don't plan to stay at their job more than a few years. No clue exactly what they are thinking, you have to hold down a job eventually nubs, but that's the mindset. Still, even if you just want the lockstep money, why rope yourself to the absolute highest hours and in many cases, the worst people to work for *cough*S&C*cough*. No shortage of firms paying $160+bonus.

Funny, I really hated the people at Cravath and WLRK while I've liked almost everyone at S&C. Helps to not be in GP.

firms that ridiculously over-hired because they did not see a slow down are in trouble, which means the summers are in trouble. HTMFH.

7:25 - what firms DIDN'T do this? Serious question. I'm hearing similar "already out of work for summers" stories from friends at other firms. (Note that this refers mainly to the corporate side.)

that this story is not attracting more attention shows that whistling thru the graveyard is alive and well....

bigsumaclasPWN3D in 2008

I know that Proskauer claims to be doing great. They have a big summer class for New York (50+) and they've opened 3 new offices in the last year. They told summers that their expansion means they'll be increasing hires, not decreasing. We'll see when offer time roles around.

Blackberries are a bad thing - it means the firms can reach you all the time.

2:35 - Thank you, Captain Obvious.

What does the Columbia chart tell us? Looks like the only firm that got 100% is Reed Smith, which is not exactly known for being an elite firm. Jones Day, not known for their large salaries and bonuses, got a higher acceptance rate than firms like Sullivan, Debevoise, and STB. And even students who get offers from Cravath don't accept them. Guess there is something more important to students who attend an elite school like Columbia than picking a firm based purely on Vault ranking? That's a crazy thought.

What order is that Columbia list in?

What order is that Columbia list in?

that chart seems off. there are way more than 3 Columbia students at sidley this summer.