Law Schools Need To Lie More About The Market

Law professor is tired of all the bad news about the legal market and he wants law schools to do a better spin job.

That’s the stunning conclusion of Professor Michael Simkovic.

Actually, given the source, that should read: “That’s the not-so-stunning conclusion of Professor Michael Simkovic.”

Simkovic, you may recall, is the author of the ever entertaining “Million Dollar Law Degree” study that posited that attending law school nets a student on average — cue Dr. Evil — ONE MILLION DOLLARS. Less taxes and tuition of course, because why would those matter? Anyway, just months after he went full tilt over a solid empirical study in the New York Times, he’s taken to the pages of Professor Brian Leiter’s blog (obviously) to make the inspiring call for law schools to step up their propaganda efforts to dupe kids out of a couple hundred thousand dollars.

Earlier this month, I charted the overwhelmingly negative press coverage of law schools and the legal profession over the last 5 years and discussed the disconnect between the news slant and economic reality. To the extent that news coverage dissuaded individuals from attending law school for financial reasons, or caused them to delay attending law school, newspapers will on average have cost each prospective law students tens of thousands, or even hundreds of thousands of dollars. The total economic harm across all prospective law students could easily be in the low billions of dollars.

Classic Simkovic approach: total up a bunch of bad assumptions into one big bad assumption that ends with “-illion.” Nothing invites panicked overreactions like a word that ends in “-illion”! But apparently the massive layoffs coupled with curtailed new hiring along with the rise of cheaper DIY legal solutions that clients are flocking toward didn’t discourage students from law school, it was “negative reporting.”

Accurate, informed, and balanced news coverage does not happen of its own volition, particularly in a world where sensationalism and negativity attract eyeballs and sell advertising.

The national press is powerful. Many journalists mean well, but they lack deep expertise and often face tight deadlines and financial pressures. Sometimes editors and journalists use their power irresponsibly.

Pesky journalists. Bear in mind that his most recent public tirade about “negative reporting” was directed, not at some New York Times reporter out of his depth, but at Ohio State Law School Professor Deborah J. Merritt’s empirical study of 2010 grads. Apparently a study tracking the real lives of 2010 grads could not be as accurate as Simkovic’s speculative model guessing at the lifetime earnings of a lawyer based on data from the classes of 1996 to 2008 (i.e., pre-market collapse). Nope. That Merritt study can’t be right. This guy sees more skewed polls than a Romney advisor on election night.

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And it’s not just Professor Merritt. Before that incident, Simkovic had beefs with law professors like Paul Campos (who penned a fun response to this article) and Brian Tamanaha. But I guess it’s more collegial (and faux credible) to pretend this is all the work of n’er-do-well muckrakers.

Simkovic thinks the law schools have done a terrible job standing up to this parade of accurate data negative reporting.

Collective action problems precluded any individual law school from acting unilaterally to correct the record and from bearing all of the associated costs for a small fraction of the benefits. The few deans and professors who did speak out, like Martin Katz, Larry Mitchell, or Stephen Diamond, became lightning rods for criticism. Critics targeted them and their institutions for retaliation.

Um. No. Saying Larry Mitchell was targeted for retaliation over defending law schools is like saying Quizno’s got Jared Fogle fired. There’s just no comparison whatsoever between “defending law schools” and “allegations of sexual harassment and retaliatory constructive firings.”

Anyway, Simkovic thinks law schools lack a key tool:

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Whereas many industries have trade associations that employ professionals to work with journalists and help them provide more accurate, informed, and fair news coverage, law schools were unprepared to interact with the press in ways that would encourage more responsible and accurate coverage.

That sounds suspiciously like the Fox News commitment to “Fair and Balanced” reporting. By which he means more reporting of tripe like this:

For many college graduates, the $30,000 to $60,000 extra per year that they can typically earn with a law degree will mean the difference between living in a safe and clean neighborhood or one that is dangerous and polluted. The expected boost to earnings can improve the healthfulness of their food, the quality of their healthcare, and the quality of education they can afford to provide for their own children. For most law graduates, the extra earnings will affect when and whether they can afford to retire. One of the best things law schools can do to help the middle class is to educate more of them.

Holy hyperbole Batman. “The difference between living in a safe and clean neighborhood or one that is dangerous and polluted.” I refuse to believe this was written with a straight face. You know how most law students make the decision to retire these days? When they can’t find a job. Only 60 percent of the law school class of 2014 have full-time jobs (UPDATE — 8/29/15 9:49 p.m.: This is full-time employment with bar passage — so if you’re stupid enough to think an appreciable number of law grads — like 20 percent or so of law grads nationwide — are just chilling in a federal clerkship, god bless your soul). It’s only 57 percent for the class of 2013 (UPDATE — 8/29/15 9:49 p.m.: In fairness, Harper reams this number as underselling it, but you get the message). But that’s just the biased New York Times citing the equally biased “American Bar Association.” Whoever those jokers are.

Anyway, Simkovic is tired of these motherf**king nabobs of negativism on this motherf**king academic journey of discovery:

The AALS is too obscure to make a dent by passively posting stories and tweets and then waiting for a journalist to find the few that happen to be interesting or relevant to them. A more active approach is needed. The AALS needs to monitor press coverage, engage with individual journalists who cover law and higher education issues through individualized emails, phone calls, and in person meetings and deliver personally tailored content that each journalist is particularly likely to find relevant and interesting based on their past coverage and the stories they are currently researching.

The AALS should also rapidly correct inaccuracies (within hours), respond with clear and well-supported facts and data, and connect journalists with experts who can speak with authority about particular issues. This should not be a low priority task fobbed off on volunteers or low paid student interns—it should be a fulltime job for experienced professional staffers, who regularly engage with AALS senior leadership.

Awesome. I’m following AALS on Twitter (it’s @TheAALS… I never knew they had an account until this article, which says something about their social media outreach) and would love to engage.

Unfortunately for Simkovic, I don’t think engaging with the AALS will change my mind much. He cites this article as an example of balanced AALS-inspired reporting, and it basically says, “Yeah, we’re struggling, but look, law schools are making cool clinics! That’s ‘practice-y’ and stuff, right?” And I’ve talked about my support of those efforts while cautioning that they’re often marketed as gimmicks with little to no empirical connection to earning a job. The point is, if this is the height of getting the pro-law school argument out there, it leaves a lot to be desired.

Look, AALS is right that there is a lawyer shortage in America. But that shortage is entirely in low-paying jobs that lawyers can’t get because law schools put them in so much debt they can’t afford to work there and the whole house of cards of sky-high tuition is built on propagandists telling students that their legal education is about making “ONE MILLION DOLLARS” instead of “serving poor and rural communities.”

But there I go being all negative again.

Law Schools’ Four Billion Dollar Collective Action Problem (Michael Simkovic) [Leiter’s Law School Reports]
Too Many Law Students, Too Few Legal Jobs [New York Times]
Educators Make The Case For Going To Law School [Chronicle of Higher Education]
Quantities are limited [Lawyers, Guns & Money]

Earlier: Another Garbage Study Offering Misleading Statistics On The Value Of A Law Degree
‘Everyone Should Go To Law School’ Poster Child Goes Full Tilt
3 Legal Stories That Dominated the Week
Which Law Schools Have The Best Clinics?