Anonymous Lawyer

I just got into the office this morning, after not nearly enough sleep last night.  We did a pub crawl for the summers, and I tagged along for a while.  It's getting close to the end of the summer, so the events get ratcheted up a bit in terms of expense.  The final sales pitch, to make sure we get a good conversion rate on the offers we hand out.  Plus a couple of summers are ending today to go back and work a few weeks for the firms they worked for after 1L year to make sure they get offers.  We did a $100/per person dinner and then were scheduled to hit about 4 bars, on the firm's tab, for an hour each.  I left after the second stop, but still didn't get home until after 1 A.M.  I found myself in a conversation with a couple of summer associates who insisted that the salaries we pay to first- and second-year lawyers aren't nearly high enough to support a reasonable lifestyle, especially with housing prices so high, and paying off law school debt, and the cost of a luxury car these days -- they asked me what percent of cars in the parking lot I'd guess cost under $30,000.  I said I wouldn't know. They apparently went out and counted one day.  10%, at least in the lawyer spaces.  They didn't look at the support staff area.  So they need to buy a nice car, rent a nice apartment or put a down payment on a nice house, food's expensive, vacation, taxes... it adds up.  It used to be that the salary was the one thing no one would complain about.  I guess we're finally reaching that point though.