Prestige of the Lawyer Profession: Pay Wage and the Ranking

A lawyer is a person who is licensed by the state that practises the law and guides their clients with their cases and legal matters. Lawyers have clients who need to settle a problem with the court or for any reason and the lawyer is there to go through their cases which are written documents and improve or help their clients’ case. Either the lawyer is defending the person that is “filing the lawsuit” or “defending the lawsuit” their job is to win the case, whatever the case may be. Whichever case wins, the problem is resolved through a lawsuit. The responsibilities that come with every case is to; interview their client/clients, give legal advice to their clients, do lots of research, of course legal research, having to take site inspections, “arguing motions” with a judge present, “drafting legal documents,” and taking statements. Each lawyer has a different case and different job to do daily because each case is different.

The median annual pay of a lawyer is 115,820 or even 160,000 USD. The lawyers’ pay depends on what type of law they practice in and the salary is high enough to make it the second highest paid job in America. The highest paying Metro areas for lawyers aren’t really necessary, the Metros with the highest concentrations of lawyers. “Other Metro areas with a high concentrations of lawyers are: Philadelphia, PA; San francisco -Redwood City south San Francisco, CA and New York-Jersey City-White Plains, and NY-NJ.” The educational experience someone needs to become a lawyer takes a certain amount of years of school before they can become a lawyer. The usual amount of time is seven years of “full on studying after high school...” Four “years of undergraduate study,” and afterwards three years of law school. “Lastly, lawyers must have a Juris Doctor degree from a law school and that degree must be licensed by the American Bar Association.” All of these years of school (including law school), followed by a degree, is mandatory because of the fact that lawyers will be working with the law and they need to be fully qualified in order to win cases and help their clients. The law is nothing people can just guess on, so it does seem fair that lawyers are required to attend the total amount of school.

Working as a lawyer is a great job but not all places are the best to work as a lawyer. In small towns it is not a great idea to be a lawyer because of the fact that there is not much of crime or population. In larger cities there are more cases to win, or bigger cases to win, larger cities are most likely to have more crime and seem to be overpopulated. For an example the best locations for lawyers to work for are the cities, Los Angeles and New York. There are great sites to see in those cities but there is much crime and cases to deal with in those cities because of the overpopulation. There are several different types of cases and lawyers which are also known as attorneys. For example pro bono publico (English: for the public good) is usually shortened to pro bono, is one type of case. Pro bono publico is a Latin phrase that means, “professional work undertaken voluntarily and without payment.” These lawyers are lawyers that do these cases for the society, for people who cannot afford an attorney. Hence the name, they take these cases for the good of the public.

One example of different types of lawyers is, defense lawyers. Defense lawyers are lawyers who defend the people who are being charged “with criminal activity.” Those who are defending a lawsuit also need a lawyer/attorney, and the defense lawyers are there for that specific reason. Those kind of lawyers see that there is a chance that the guilty person can possibly be found innocent. Prosecutors are the exact opposite of defense lawyers, the prosecutors are the attorneys that defend the people who are filling out the lawsuit against the person that is being charged with criminal actions. All of this can be background experience for when people want to become lawyers.

Relocating is optional for working lawyers. Lawyers have the option to move anywhere around the United States “if they are strong enough academically.” Which means if they have much money or success in their work because of the fact that they have won several cases then they have a choice to relocate. If lawyers want to relocate because of the lack of cases, or because there are too many cases, they have the option to relocate or move around the United States. However, being a lawyer is not like other jobs where it is mandatory to relocate where their company says to. When people become lawyers there are several different courthouses they can work in. First, city courts, afterwards state courts, then federal courts, and finally supreme courts. City courts are for when the certain cases are dealing with crimes and offenses to the city or town they live in, which is why it is called a city court.

A state court is for cases where the guilty party has offended a federal government or the state. Our federal court is one of the three branches “of the government of the United States organized under the United States.” The supreme court in the United States is “the highest federal court in the United States.” So basically it is the highest court in the United States, and all of these courthouses can be career advancements when you are a lawyer it is possible to work in all of these courts. Lawyers have to work hard in order to succeed at their job. Most lawyers work full time but at most likely forty-fifty hours per week. Sometimes even sixty-seventy hours a week. It is hard work but those hours a week do pay off, for people (the lawyers’ clients) and for the lawyer/attorney. Being a lawyer isn’t for everyone but it is a good job. Even if you do sometimes work sixty-seventy hours per week. For lawyers to receive yearly salary advancements they would need to have a case by case basis. The more cases they win the more money they will get paid. The best paid lawyer makes $153,265-$174,860. The lowest paid lawyer makes $130,880 a year. So, most of the time the lawyers in larger cities may get paid more because of the overpopulation and the common/often crime. The lawyers in smaller towns probably get paid less because there may not be much crime for them to have much cases, and if they possibly did have cases, they would be very small cases. So once more, lawyers’ yearly salary advancements all depend on their cases, the amount and just simply what the case is.

The ranking of a lawyer depends on their educational background and the amount of cases they have won. If one lawyer has a higher degree in school than another they out rank them because of their degree. Also the more cases they have won, and the more famous they become, the more they will out rank. So, it is all depending on where the lawyer is located for the cases, and how high their degree is. Also, if they are more famous than of course more people know about them so of course they are going to out rank. As a lawyer, if they would want to travel for work. They can there are a various amount of court houses all around the United States so it should not be a problem for lawyers to travel. Especially if they are from a small town and do not want to completely relocate. Also if that lawyer is famous where people are calling from other cities then that lawyer would go and travel around to take those cases. However traveling is not mandatory in the work of a lawyer.

To become a lawyer there is no special training only educational training for example, studying for the bar exam (which is mandatory to pass and take), mock trials (which are considered practice in school), debate classes (which is also practice during school). Other than this and studying, going to school, there is no other or special types of training to be a lawyer. There are many different benefits to becoming a lawyer, for example there is a wide selection of career options. Once you have the required amount of school and degree, then there are lots of jobs that become available. Also there is plentiful of financial rewards but also emotional rewards. Knowing that you helped someone should be an emotional reward. However, it does come to a point where people do not want to work as a lawyer anymore. All lawyers retire at different times, sometimes it is mandatory but sometimes they just want to. Fifty percent retire because it was a mandatory retirement. Thirty-eight percent of the mandatory retirements retired at sixty-five, and thirty-six percent retired at age seventy. Twenty-seven percent wish to retire early, twenty-nine are planning to retire at “retirement age.” Twenty-nine percent “plan to retire later,” four percent of the lawyers do not want to retire at all and eleven percent are simply not sure.