For those of you in the New York area, our current location -- we're up visiting from Washington, DC -- here's an event next month you might be interested in:

Sunday - Tuesday, October 22-24, 2006
Benjamin N. Cardozo School of Law

Three-day conference: "Jews and the Legal Profession", at 55 Fifth Avenue at 12th Street.

Participants include Alan Dershowitz, Stuart Eizenstat, and many others. For more information and registration, please e-mail xxx@yahoo.com or call 212-xxx-xxxx.

Other conferences you might enjoy:

-- "Japanese Chefs and Sushi Preparation"

-- "Koreans and the Dry Cleaning Industry"

-- "Filipinos and the Domestic Arts"

We're sticking to the Asians 'cause, well, that's what we are.*

Here is the conference's website. We suggest that the organizers reach out to the "Jews and Web Page Design" crew.

Jews and the Legal Profession [Cardozo Law School]

* Three notes of preemptive defense: (1) it's not "racist" to note that certain racial or ethnic groups make up a disproportionate percentage of a particular profession or industry; (2) this is less objectionable than a lot of material you'd see on The Daily Show, SNL, etc.; (3) we are not commenting, negatively or positively, on the contributions Jews have made to the legal profession. We're merely suggesting that, in the grand scheme of things, there are more urgent topics out there to hold conferences about. Thank you.

The WSJ Law Blog brings us news of an article, posted online back in July, concerning fees charged by professional services firms in the bankruptcy context:

An unpublished academic study of bankruptcy-court legal fees, which was posted online in July, has put the law firm of Skadden, Arps, Slate, Meagher & Flom LLP on the defensive.

The study by professor Lynn LoPucki and his colleague Joseph Doherty of University of California, Los Angeles asserts that in the bankruptcies of 74 public companies, Skadden’s fees were 46% higher than other debtors’ counsel.

Skadden, a bankruptcy powerhouse, represented 10 of the 74 debtors, whose plans were confirmed between 1998 and 2003. Mr. LoPucki explains that since Skadden’s hourly rates weren’t any higher than other firms, Skadden must have billed more hours per case, on average.

Skadden is expensive? And they bill "more hours per case, on average," than other law firms? Heh, we could have told you that without some fancy "study."

Sure, large firms overstaff everything. But even within the precincts of Biglaw, Skadden is known for taking the "Chinese army" approach to staffing: throw enough people on a case, and you'll get a good result.

(For more substantive, less glib responses to the LoPucki/Doherty study, check out the comments to the WSJ Law Blog post.)

Skadden’s Bankruptcy Bills [WSJ Law Blog]