Stanford Law School is at least one academic institution that remain confident that their students will get jobs. “Law Shucks,” a blog that tracks the legal industry, estimates that major law firms laid off over 4,000 lawyers in 2009. But SLS Law School Dean Larry Kramer said that while the job market is “tighter” now than it has been, new lawyers will still find it welcoming, according to a report from the Stanford Daily.
“The same bubble existed in the legal market as in the rest of the economy,” Kramer said. “Students graduating this year and maybe next year have to deal with the fallout from that. But I don’t foresee any long-term significant changes in professional prospects for being a lawyer.” In terms of finding employment, new graduates from SLS have been insulated from the effects of the recession so far, according to the school.
AbovetheLaw reports that the issues this year for legal jobs is not so much unemployment as UNDERemployment.
To quote ATL: “The year isn’t off to a good start, but it’s the same bad news it’s been for a while. Focus is increasingly turning to the underemployment rate, rather than the unemployment rate. 
It’s the same old denominator problem. Unemployment looks not bad (relatively speaking) at first glance – it was flat at 10.2%. But 661,000 people left the US labor force last month and a similar number of jobs were lost. Had the denominator remained constant, unemployment would have been 10.4%. Overall, 1.7 million Americans left the workforce in the second half of 2009, which was a 1.1% decline, and the workforce as a percentage of total population hit the lowest point since 1985.”
Those seeking legal jobs have little to seek solace about during 2009, but a Lawyer story reported in LawFuel gives a good insight into the changes that have taken place in the UK legal industry in the past decade, with a major move towards the major legal 
centers of London and New York. Clifford Chance’s David Childs (pictured) and others speak.
We covered a story about the changing New Zealand legal jobs scene with a report non unfamiliar for law employers anywhere – the fact that it’s been a buyers’ market but things may well (fingers crossed and all that) change for the poor, bedraggled lawyers out there trying to find/keep/change law jobs. It’s looking a bit better Down Under, but the northern hemisphere law jobs scene looks set for some further turbulence before the calm waters return. 
The computer-animated video, A Law School Carol is no heartwarming holiday tale of redemption, as The National Law Journal reports, and has been circulating on YouTube. It’s all about a law student called Steve.
” The ghosts of Steve’s prelaw, law school and postlaw school lives visit him to offer a sobering accounting of the sacrifices he made to attend law school, the staggering debt he assumed in the process and the limited prospects his degree from a third-tier school will afford. 
“Wake up and smell the student loan payments!” the ghost of law school present warns.”
The video may be a joke, but the argument isn’t. On the Internet and in academic circles, there is widespread debate over the value of a juris doctor, and whether the degree is a wise investment for many of the thousands who flock to law schools each year. Law schools have always had detractors, but the rising cost of legal education and the dearth of jobs available to new graduates is prompting more people to urge prospective law students to think twice before they write their first tuition check.
The ABA Journal reports all the bad law jobs news – as do we, regrettably. According to seasonally adjusted numbers, the law industry lost 2,900 jobs in November in the US, according to the Bureau of Labor Statistics says in this month’s report. 
The New York Times noted that the Bureau of Labor Statistics “revised the job loss in September and October, shrinking the overall number of job losses by 159,000.” But comparing the revised numbers in this month’s report to the original November and October reports, reveals that legal services sector job losses for those months have actually increased.
Where it was originally reported that 5,800 law jobs lost in October, the stats in this month’s release indicates 6,000 jobs were lost; and where 2,000 law jobs were reported lost in September, the stats in this month’s release indicate 2,400 were actually lost.
“We haven’t decided what we are paying in 2010. We are trying to figure out what the market is,” Richard Fijolek of Dallas, the firm’s financial partner, told Tex Parte. Fijolek says he wants to see where the BigTex market rate settles before setting salaries for 2010.
BigLaw salaries for first-years have been in a downward trend: Morrison & Foerster also scaled its salaries down to $145,000 for its offices outside of Texas and Asia, and Reed Smith now has starting pay ranges set between $110,000 and $130,000.
The National Law Journal took a look at what it takes to get a law jobs in the new environment. In a down economy, law firms across the spectrum of size, geography and practice concentration have reduced their hiring goals. We all know about the layoffs – boring. But while some law firms have disappeared and law jobs have gone by the thousands, the financial turmoil may herald changes in the recruitment process that could eventually work a fundamental restructuring of employment in the profession. Here are some steps jobseekers may consider to help adapt to the new recruitment practices. 
n a buyer’s market, law firms can afford to be more selective. Reduced profit margins and client demands for more efficient service, moreover, make every hiring decision more important.
As a result of these economic changes, firms have begun to apply more stringent criteria in hiring, and some have employed more rigorous new forms of screening. Both the ABA Journal and American Lawyer, for example, recently reported on the use of “behavioral interviewing,” in which candidates are asked specific questions about how they have handled difficult circumstances in the past.
UK changes to the ‘lockstep’ model of associate remuneration may also be working in the US legal jobs’ scene as some US firms consider the approach adopted in Reed Smith’s new ‘talent model’. Reed Smith has been shaking up associate remuneration, cutting pay by 20 per cent and replacing the longstanding lockstep with the introduction of bandings for junior, mid-level and senior associates.
The Lawyer blog reports the London managing partner of a US firm saying “In terms of abilities, people progress at different speeds, so having some concept of junior, mid and senior bandings of associates makes sense,” said the managing partner. “I also think that this would be consistent with what’s happening at the UK firms. It’s just modernising the system.”
So far as money, money money is concerned, the differential between Skadden Arps and Cravaths is likely to be less than it has been when Skadden’s had a bonus twice that of Cravaths previously
If anything this year’s bonus season is the most significant ever. Skadden’s?closely?watched announcement comes at a time of massive upheaval among associate ranks.
“Reality is dawning,” says Jomati consultant Tony Williams. “The profits at most US firms are likely to be flat or down, probably by around 5-10 per cent, with a few exceptions. This year bonuses are only going to be given very, very sparingly.”
Just as the legal jobs scene in the UK looks better, theres talk of dumping the lockstep promotion model for associates, reports The Lawyer. Freshfields has already revealed details of its new ‘career milestone’ model, which will replace the lockstep with a system based on specific development criteria. Several firms, including Norton Rose and Pinsent Masons, have already abandoned PQE, while CMS Cameron McKenna and Simmons & Simmons are among those understood to be reviewing their systems. However, one partner at a City firm believes the moves could backfire. “I’m sceptical about what will happen,” he said. “My worry is that, as soon as the market picks up and everyone wants to keep associates, you can’t risk it.”