Law Schools

Higher Law School Tuition Equals Higher Law Student Enrollment

The results of this study are simply dumbfounding.

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At most law schools, the tuition is egregiously high and can lead to graduates who are drowning in student loans without a way to reliably service their debts, but according to a new study, prospective law students don’t seem to care.

Despite the fact that critics of rising law school tuition have been warning would-be lawyers about the dangers of student debt, it seems that the higher the tuition, the more likely it is that these students will enroll. According to Professor Amy Li of the University of Northern Colorado’s department of leadership, policy, and development, the more a law school charges, the more likely it is that admitted applicants will enroll. This result seems to defy good logic.

Here’s more about Li’s mind-boggling study from Karen Sloan of Law.com:

“The findings highlight the willingness of students to apply to and enroll at law schools despite increases in tuition and fees,” Li wrote in her paper, “Dollars and Sense: Student Price Sensitivity to Law School Tuition.” “This study reveals that there is in fact, a lack of price sensitivity in legal education.”

She gathered data from the American Bar Association and the Law School Admission Council on tuition and fees, scholarships, applicants and enrollment from 2006 to 2015 and ran a statistical analysis to identify correlations.

Law students may understand that their employment prospects are the best at elite law schools that charge the most, Li theorized, and thus are willing to pay top dollar. Or law students may feel more comfortable paying for the school they want because they are older and more established than undergraduates, she speculated. Law students may also be savvier than undergraduates about federal loan repayment options such as income-based repayment—which limits monthly payments to a percentage of their income—and public service loan forgiveness, Li wrote.

The current cost of in-state tuition and living expenses at public law schools is about $45,000 on average, while the cost tuition and living expenses is more than $67,000 on average at private law schools. This means that law students paying full freight and debt-financing their degrees will wind up with between $135,000 and $201,000 in educational loans, and yet, it seems as if they’re completely indifferent to the debt they’ll have accumulated at graduation. That’s because, as Li notes, “[l]aw schools can’t be thought of traditionally from the supply and demand economic perspective. The product students are getting is more complex than an iPhone. It’s a complicated endeavor and students still see value in it and are willing to shoulder more of the costs themselves in hopes that it will pay off in the future.”

What’s even more shocking is that according to Li’s research, students are willing to pay more money to attend less prestigious law schools. Li separated separated schools into five tiers based on their median LSAT scores, and it turns out that law schools in the third and fourth tiers were able to enroll more students when their net costs were higher. We knew many prospective law students were bad at math, but we didn’t think they were that bad at math. Here’s more on that brow-raising finding from Li’s paper:

“Students were more willing to pay higher out-of-pocket prices to attend less prestigious law schools, even though the employment prospects of graduating from such law schools were less certain,” Li wrote. “Nevertheless, this relationship did not hold for the lowest tier of law schools, tier 5, where median LSAT scores were less than 150. Evidently, students were not willing to pay more to attend the lowest tier of law schools, although these law schools also did not observe declines in enrollment when net costs increased.”

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That sound you heard was the collective sigh of those who have been trying for years to encourage law schools to slash tuition to save law students from debt nightmares. Although this study seems to make those efforts seem pointless, it’s still worth it to rally against rising law school tuition costs. Although law students may have high hopes of securing a $190,000 salary at their first job, not everyone will be able to do so, which means that not everyone will be able to repay their law school debts.

Please keep fighting to keep law school tuition in check — unless, of course, you’re simply waiting for the student loan bubble to burst in the hope of getting bailed out on your own loans. That might happen, but you’ll probably default first before it does.

Higher Law School Tuition Actually Boosts Enrollment, Study Finds [Law.com]

Staci ZaretskyStaci Zaretsky is a senior editor at Above the Law, where she’s worked since 2011. She’d love to hear from you, so please feel free to email her with any tips, questions, comments, or critiques. You can follow her on Twitter or connect with her on LinkedIn.

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