The National Association for Law Placement Inc. has released new data that shows recent law school graduates are finding more job opportunities and even higher starting salaries, according to The Birmingham Business Journal.
NALP said in its most recent report that the overall unemployment rate was affected by a very large graduating class, one of the largest in the history of the industry.
For law graduates in 2013, the employment rate as of February 15 dropped to 84.5 percent. This is down slightly from the 84.7 percent for the class of 2012 and it is a drop of 7.4 percent since it hit a 24-year high of 91.9 percent back in 2007. This is the lowest employment rate since the recession.
NALP Executive Director James Leipold said the following in the release about the statistics:
“In the best of times, law school graduates have entered the labor force by taking many different kinds of jobs, not all of which can be described as actually practicing law or even law-related. As the legal services market continues to change at a rapid pace following the dramatic downsizing during the recession, the variety and diversity of jobs that law grads take now is greater than ever. In general, the picture that emerges is one of slow growth, and growth that is a blend of continued shrinkage and downsizing in some areas offset by growth in other areas. In general, the legal sector is best described as mostly flat in the Spring of 2014, with overall sector headcount still off by more than 40,000 jobs from its pre-recession high according to data from the U.S. Bureau of Labor Statistics. The entry-level job market reflects that mostly flat business environment for the legal sector generally.”
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