What to make of law schools increasing employment statistics? Forum

[preamble]

I've noticed quite a few law schools on LST have seen significant jumps in their employment rates since 2011.

Some examples:

Pace University 35.6 (2011) -> 74.1 (2017)
Albany Law 48.7 (2011) -> 70.9 (2017)
UNH 42.9 (2011) -> 75.4 (2017)
UMass 20.4(!) (2013) -> 53.1 (2017)

etc.

I'm not making any sort of judgment on whether these are good employment scores for a law school - just that they are a lot higher than a few years ago. Will these employment scores hold? Or are they liable to go down once another economic slump hits us?

[nixy]

A lot is probably an improved economy. Some of it could be better reporting practices and adjusting class sizes (no idea if it is for any of those specific schools, but could be).

[cavalier1138]

It's the economy, stupid. (For those of you with no historical literacy, this is a reference, not an insult. But the jab about having no historical literacy is definitely an insult.)

The schools you listed are the ones most likely to get hit hard if/when there's another hiring slump. Yes, top schools' hiring numbers suffered during the recession, but a number of low-tier schools only existed because of how strong the hiring market had been. Those schools' numbers got absolutely massacred, and they've only been able to improve them because the economy bounced back and because they cut enrollment.

And I agree that reporting practices might have something to do with it, depending on the institution. My best guess is that some less scrupulous schools figured out that they could use fellowships and/or local clerkships to boost employment numbers after the ABA imposed the current requirements and stopped them from counting baristas along with practicing lawyers.

[preamble]

It's the economy, stupid.

I automatically read this in Carville's cajun drawl.