Quote:
Originally Posted by Kevin
I know lawyers who office out of their apartments. And generally to join a federal Bar Association or for State dues, it's only around $200 or so, which just about anyone can scrounge up or put on a credit card.
As far as getting on that list, if it's through the Federal Public Defender's office, I doubt that costs anything. If it's a fairly uniform system (and I'm guessing that's the case), then you just get in contact with the public defender, sit second-chair on something that goes to trial and you're ready to go. Doesn't pay great, but it pays.
Something I know a few lawyers do is just hang out in the courtroom at the criminal arraignment dockets and get appointed to represent (for a fee, of course) whatever unrepresented criminal defendants happen to be there that day. In fact, there are a few folks around here who I'm pretty sure do only that and don't actually even have offices.
And once you're a member of the federal Bar, get some good bankruptcy software and that can be a lucrative and easy field to make money in. As a lawyer, you're never unemployed because if you do a good job networking (note: networking means not networking with other lawyers, church, rotary, etc., are much more reliable ways to pick up clients).
Also, if you can get a simple website online, once you get it indexed well with the search engines, you'll be able to bring in quite a few cases that way. In this profession, getting a job with some big firm is highly overrated. Starting solo, you'll make a lot less money in the short run, but in the long run, in terms of stress and even money, you're more than likely going to come out ahead.
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Thank you for the advice. We're not comfortable enough with giving up the retail paycheck (and it is a decent retail job, not one he's likely to find again) to take the chance on solo practice. He's at the court twice a week, sometimes more, and sees more lawyers waiting around to represent the unrepresented than there are cases. It's a risky move at this point for us, and we don't have much of a safety net if it fails.
And big firm jobs aren't even on his radar -- the only person we know out here who managed to go the traditional big firm route is a high school friend who graduated top 10% from Stanford, and even she had her offer deferred. He's looking at the government, smaller boutique firms, and clerkships with judges.
I don't have any interest in belaboring this point -- just saying that people directed toward DC as the Land of Jobs are going to be disappointed.