Solicitors.........enough work out there??

l.m

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Hi there, basically my question is aimed at people working in the legal industry.........particulary solicitors. Is there enough work out there to go around? I am currently looking to qualify as a solicitor but, am i wasting my time? Do you think i will just join a queue of other solicitors seeking work. Would people advise me to reconsider my career options??
Another thing i'd like people's opinion on is whether you consider the career of a solicitor a very closed shop career? I have been faced with alot of rejection over the years based on my lack of contacts and lack of legal connections in my family? is this the case for other people?
 
1. There is not enough work to go around.

2. It is not a closed shop career. Certainly there can be an appearance if it - but it is an appearance only. Anyone who is able to qualify as a solicitor can immediately go into practice.
 
second MOB. Don't go into conveyancing! And I know people with no legal friends who work as solicitors.
 
Third MOB. It's very hard these days, with not enough work and huge competition.
 
I agree. A lot of existing solicitors are going to have to shut up shop. In order to generate enough work to earn an average enough living you have to put in a lot of time getting the work, you have to know and be liked by a lot of people, really have to work your contacts, have to do a lot of voluntary work and show your face in a lot of places.

AND you have to know your law, the right barristers, which other solicitors to trust all whilst minding lots of other peoples money and devising and operating quality systems to ensure you don't get sued. Don't get me wrong, I enjoy my work but you really have to love it. I have a friend the same age who did primary teaching straight from school, not knocking teachers, its a tough job, but on an hourly rate basis she earns double what I do, and has a pension.

Plus you have to put up with everybody thinking you are loaded, which really annoys me, but of course you just have to smile and put up with it.
 
Plus you have to put up with everybody thinking you are loaded, which really annoys me, but of course you just have to smile and put up with it.

But I thought solicitors like giving the impression of being loaded?? Go on humour us whats your biggest expense in last 2 years?? :D
 
A very shiny, sexy, sparkly 8000 euro insurance policy aka contibution to Michael Lynn client relief fund.

Might think about the cigars , may be a bit kinky for a woman tho.
 
"Go on humour us whats your biggest expense in last 2 years?? "

Fluorescent bicycle clips!

mf
 
Hey guys any of you want a nice inexpensive expense............an apprentice? hehe she will be loyal and give you hours and hours of hard work ;) Way more efficient than a RR Vogue and way better for your health than a cigar hehe
 
I have a friend the same age who did primary teaching straight from school, not knocking teachers, its a tough job, but on an hourly rate basis she earns double what I do, and has a pension.
Are you perhaps mixing up classroom hours with working hours?
 
Revenue figures disclosed in Competition Authority report put median income of Solicitors at €150k pa (2004). I assume this is gross and does include pension contribution. The primary school teacher income is up to €62k, but that is for 176 days a year (not full days), and includes a defined benefit pension. Salaries for secondary and tertiary teachers are higher than this. If you add the pension benefit, say 25%, then teachers income could be valued at circa €78k, which is still considerably below disclosed median income of solicitors, although the hours worked are substantially less. However, given the number of solicitors who continue to qualify it looks like Solicitors could find themselves as the new taxi men - too many chasing too little general practice work. Maybe the public will be sympathetic or maybe Solicitors will become a new radical group and look for a capping of their numbers on the basis that economic studies suggest that too many solicitors are not in the public interest, as it creates greater litigation???
 
Revenue figures disclosed in Competition Authority report put median income of Solicitors at €150k pa (2004). I assume this is gross and does include pension contribution. .................................If you add the pension benefit, say 25%, then teachers income could be valued at circa €78k, which is still considerably below disclosed median income of solicitors, although the hours worked are substantially less.

Sorry to quibble, but you are comparing apples with oranges. Misuse of statistics is one of my pet peeves. The Competition Authority report did not put median income of solicitors at €150k per annum. It cited a median income for Solicitor business owners of €140k, a median of €52k for "Associate" solicitors and a median of €48k for "employed solicitors".

The comparison is by any not by any means perfect because most teachers are employees while a relatively high proportion of solicitors own and operate their own business. So I do concede that comparing employee solicitors to employee teachers would not be a perfectly valid comparison either. The truth, I rather suspect, is that a single headline income figure is simply not a useful way to compare the two careers.

Mind you, there are undoubtedly some private education facilities out there owned and operated by qualified teachers. I very much doubt that these owner managers have (or had at the relevant time) a median income of €78k.
 
Sorry to quibble, but you are comparing apples with oranges. Misuse of statistics is one of my pet peeves. The Competition Authority report did not put median income of solicitors at €150k per annum. It cited a median income for Solicitor business owners of €140k, a median of €52k for "Associate" solicitors and a median of €48k for "employed solicitors".

The comparison is by any not by any means perfect because most teachers are employees while a relatively high proportion of solicitors own and operate their own business. So I do concede that comparing employee solicitors to employee teachers would not be a perfectly valid comparison either. The truth, I rather suspect, is that a single headline income figure is simply not a useful way to compare the two careers.

Mind you, there are undoubtedly some private education facilities out there owned and operated by qualified teachers. I very much doubt that these owner managers have (or had at the relevant time) a median income of €78k.

No problem with quibbling. It is a long time since I read the report, so I will assume you are right. However, my response was to previous poster comparing primary school teaching. Of course, I should add that the €62k is the top end of a large scale and median income for teachers may be (significantly) lower than that depending on age profile for such teachers (which I suspect would be young on basis of population demographics). Solicitor business owners (sole practitioners and small practices partnerships) comprise the majority of the profession.
 
Well, I'm a sole practitioner and I don't earn anything like €150k per annum. Less than half that in fact. I have two friends who are partners in 3 solicitor practices who are currently taking home less than €40k a year (they earned between 10k and 20k more per year when times were good). We are all over eight years qualified. So that's four years in college, at least a two year apprenticeship (three for most of us due to delays in the system at the time) and eight years PQE. I would love to know where the Competition Authority got its figures. Maybe they didn't leave Dublin??
 
The Competition Authority figures may have applied to partners in the "Big Five". The firgures for private practice in provincial Ireland are closer to what Kate10 haas outlined.

It is a tough professon, and getting tougher.
 
Another solicitor here! There have always been some solicitors making verylarge sums, unfortunately I wasnt one of those and doubly unfortunately the vast majority of people believed that all us solicitors were coining it for "shuffling papers around a desk".

The reality of it for me was that I worked very hard and put in long hours and was well paid but not exorbitantly so. Now after the conveyancing sector has dried up, personal injuries has dried up work is scarce,salaries have been slashed and there are no job opportunities.

I would not recommend the profession to anyone unless they felt almost a vocation for the law.

However to answer the other question of the OP it is not a closed shop..I had no connections with the law whatsoever and many of my friends were the same..those who did well did so on merit in my experience.
 
Some thing does not sound right. If you charge €250 per hour and make say 45k to 75k per year after paying rent, rates, lighting, heating, insurance, comms, office equipment etc. Where does the rest of the money go or do you spend most of your time on here :) Is that 75K net of taxes? Thinking about it more, how does my solicitor, a one woman show and single mother, afford a fancy house and new merc every couple of years!
 
Towger

You assume that every chargeable hour is filled and paid for - which is not the case. Particularly not now. One of my colleagues tells me that she is busy alright - but its dealing with clients who have fallen on hard times and are unlikely to pay her. She is working for them in the hope that things will turn around and they will stay with her - if she survives.

Your own solicitor may be operating on serious credit, or have family money, or have income from other sources..........or may be running a very tight, profitable operation.

The decline in business and income, as far as I can see, is across the board - from top to bottom.

mf
 
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