Small Law Firms, Solo Practitioners

Why Are Lawyers So Happy?

There’s so much you can do as a lawyer, there’s just about an endless stream of ways it can make you happy.

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Gary J. Ross

Gary J. Ross

I know I like being a lawyer, and I know a few other people do as well. Gloria Allred seems to be into it. It’s been good for David Boies. Judge Judy, too. But I didn’t realize just how many others until this week, when fellow columnist Jeena Cho devoted her column to a recent study by the Betty Ford Center. The numbers are eye-popping indeed.

According to Jeena’s numbers, seventy-two percent of lawyers are not depressed. Like, not even mild depression. No depression at all. Zilch. Nada. According to the ABA, there are currently 1,315,561 lawyers in the U.S. If we open up our calculator app and do some math, we find there are 947,203 happy lawyers out in the world. Nearly a million! We’re everywhere. Let’s continue with the study, again using Jeena as our guide: 81% don’t experience any anxiety (did the bar exam rid of us of our anxiety?), 77% don’t get stressed out, and a whopping 79.4% of us have problem-free drinking (more on that later).

Why are lawyers so happy? Fortunately for me, a couple of these are right there in the study, so I’m not going to have to think of something until we get to #3. Here goes:

1. Our alcohol tolerance is superb.

I was encouraged Betty Ford found that almost four-fifths of us drink with no problems. And we all know how much lawyers drink, right? So basically, we drink all the time, yet for nearly 80% of us, our drinking doesn’t present any problem whatsoever!

Let’s go deeper into the study: “A total of 2901 participants (22.6%) reported that they have felt their use of alcohol or other substances was problematic at some point in their lives; Of the 12,825 participants included in the analysis, 11,278 completed all 10 questions on the AUDIT, with 20.6% of those participants scoring at a level consistent with problematic drinking.”

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See that? 22.6% of the participants said they had a problem with alcohol at some point in their lives, yet only 20.6% of the participants — who were all lawyers — currently had a problem. So the way I read it, for two percent of the people, their alcohol problem went away once they became lawyers. Now they’re happy drunks like the rest of us! I mean, the 79.4% of us.

Let’s run the numbers again. 79.4% of 1,315,561 means there are more than 836,695 lawyers out there drinking — maybe right this very minute — yet not experiencing any problems. Let’s all raise a glass to that!

2. We like to do drugs.

I thought this part of the study was interesting: “Of participants who endorsed use of a specific substance class in the past 12 months, those using stimulants had the highest rate of weekly usage (74.1%), followed by sedatives (51.3%), tobacco (46.8%), marijuana (31.0%), and opioids (21.6%).”

So not only are there some lawyers out there who use drugs, apparently there’s a bunch who take it a step further and “endorse” the use of drugs. In fact, over 20% of these people endorse the use of opioids! How on earth have I managed to practice for over 12 years without opioids, when there are lawyers out there endorsing it? Somebody get me some Oxycodone, quick.

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3. We can be president.

Especially on the Democratic side. The only non-lawyer the Democratic Party has nominated since Jimmy Carter in 1980 is Al Gore in 2000, and Gore completed two years at Vanderbilt Law School before dropping out to run for Congress.

Why do so many lawyers successfully run for president, you ask? I’m thinking it’s because we can handle our liquor.

4. We’re good in bed.

I’ve already written about this. Sadly, it appears this might be lost on millennials. But for the rest of us, so far things are looking pretty nice — we’re drinking, we’re doing drugs, we can be president, we’re good in bed. Let’s go on.

5. We set our own billing rates.

At least those of us lucky enough to be in SmallLaw can set our own rates. Nearly every SmallLaw attorney has a story about a potential client who was undesirable for one reason or another and wanted us to represent them, and instead of giving a flat “no,” we quoted some outrageous rate, which the person agreed to. How many jobs give you that freedom?

Not only can we have different billing rates for different clients, our rate can even fluctuate for the same client, as long as we provide them notice. For example, if a client texts me instead of emailing, I tack on an extra $15 per hour to the billing rate for that month. Any communication during the Super Bowl incurs a charge of $500, with $300 charges during the conference championships.

I made those up right now. See how cool that is? Back during my social worker or waiting tables days, I didn’t have that kind of control over what clients/customers had to pay. Now I can make it up as I go along.

6. People think we’re successful.

They do! You tell people you’re a lawyer, and unless you’re from someplace where everyone’s a hedge-fund manager or a missionary, they’ll respect you. Little do they know your law school debt crushes any kind of hope you have for a life beyond bourgeois, and that there’s a tiny chance your drinking creates some problems.

But what do they know? As long as you’re getting respect. As the quote goes (from either Abraham Lincoln or P.T. Barnum — no one is really sure), “You can fool some of the people all of the time.” Sure, the quote goes on to say you can’t fool all of the people all of the time, but who needs to do that anyway? You don’t even need to fool all of the people some of the time. You just need to fool some of the people all the time. It’s not like you’re going to meet everyone in the world.

Though clearly I nailed the top six reasons lawyers are happy, incredibly there are even more reasons: some people will tell you about lawyers crusading for justice, helping people or companies reach their potential, or bringing about social change. There’s so much you can do as a lawyer, there’s just about an endless stream of ways it can make you happy. No wonder we’re so happy.

Why would anyone want to do anything else?

Gary J. Ross opened his own practice, Jackson Ross PLLC, in 2013 after several years in Biglaw and the federal government. Gary handles corporate and securities matters for startups, large and small businesses, private equity funds, and investors in each, and also has a number of non-profit clients. You can reach Gary by email at Gary.Ross@JacksonRossLaw.com.

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