Don't take it personally, we legal aid / public defender types look down our noses at all other lawyers - it's all we have, since there's no money & even the people who skip on their debts think we're worms.
This resonates with me. I was a smart kid who didn't take care of his mental health and went off the "smart person" track. I got accepted to Purdue despite not really completing my senior year of high school. Made some stupid choices at Purdue and ended up going to Purdue Calumet (Purdue NW now) in Hammond, IN. Hammond is not a great city and I had to drive 30 min. just to attend. I met people that I never would have if I stayed on the "smart person" track.
Right then I realized what people talk about the Cycle of Poverty. People are not educated enough to "play the game" and any mistake financially or legally ends the game and saddles them with 10's of thousands of dollars of unbankruptable debt. (Student loans can't be bankrupted. Hello usury!) People also got arrested just for having pot in their car which wasn't even theirs. Those days in prison were enough for them to miss several tests and fail those classes. Many people who wanted to graduate and were smart enough to do it, didn't because of this. I could practically write a whole novel about that experience.
So I sympathize with the alternate life path problem. I also made some bad decisions that have really hurt me as well. I also understand what it is to see poor people up close and be forced to understand what they go through. There are huge financial and legal barriers in place to keep the poor people poor and it is there on purpose.
There are many things our system does that gives more to the haves and makes it more difficult on the have-nots. “Hard work is all you need” is bogus. Most people ARE stuck—hello progressive income tax—in the United States, unless you’re part of a client class who gets special favored, or you’re incredibly lucky. That’s the sad truth. Maybe it didn’t used to be like this, but it sure is now.
Look forward to reading your law school story next. I was on the other end of the bell curve - I made $125k as a first year (which was nuts, but not that nuts compared to the $180k first years were making about 10 years later). I was blessed. But I had to walk away after about 10 years of Big Law because I didn’t want to keep going down the path that I saw was required to stay in the game. The rates of mental health issues, substance abuse problems, and toxic family dynamics were tragic, in many cases worn like combat ribbons. This was in NYC where guys had coke dealers coming to their offices to make deliveries in between fittings of bespoke suits.
I have some really fond memories of particular things I worked on, but those were the rare bright spots in a dark profession. I walked away and took over a section of a state legal aid program where we helped low income veterans. The best thing I ever did as a lawyer, and it wasn’t really even lawyering, was helping a homeless Vietnam veteran move out of a tent in the woods into housing. And, I got to fight debt collection lawyers and make them spend a lot of time and money proving up chain of title for the debts they bought :)
Like most higher education, prospective customers looking to purchase a law degree so that they can have an entry ticket to the bar exam are lied to about the cost vs reward. Most graduates earn a relative pittance based on what is increasingly a six-figure ante to the game. Large starting salaries at prestigious Big Law firms are what are advertised, but there are precious few of those slots and those firms are built to grind you out and attrit 90% of each first year class in the first 6-10 years.
I have friends who did the big law thing going in, knowing it was temporary and unsustainable and only to pay off the student-loan debts. Which begs the question: why don’t people realize how sick it is that we encourage the accrual of debt to work in soul-crushing jobs just to pay said debt, with the understanding that nobody wants to be in this field in the first place?
Law is the field for those of us who didn’t know what we wanted to do with our lives at the time, but basically had to make a decision. Poor choices lead to poor outcomes, every single time.
My first job out of college was selling debt collection services. I didn't do any collection, but I was a salesman who tried to persuade businesses to sign up and then help them set up and sort accounts. It was 100% commission. I was real good at it for a while, but ultimately I did not get all the money I earned because, irony of ironies, the people trying to collect on others did not want to pay the bill themselves.
Usually it is contingency and based on the total dollar amount of the placed portfolio and collectibility of the debt. The higher the fee rate the harder it is to collect as well as how many times it was ran through the gauntlet before and how many other places had it. Was it full of disputes or predatory loans, ie sub prime, primary or secondary lender or the dreaded e commerce? Surely you knew if or how likely it was to pay based on assessing these things along with the clients business model you were collecting for to base your selling points on why it was worth anyone's time to even send out the 1st notice. Were there tons of customer service issues? Did the lender just want to beat up customers who couldn't pay or that they rushed through and broke the laws in place to push the debt through instead of work with the consumer. I'll tell you what if it was all of the above the client doesn't get paid unless the agency gets paid and bad business and paper is what we call firesale. Due diligence done and if not it's not worth putting the agency/purchaser/ firm at risk for violations and lawsuits from smart consumers where the collector is at risk themselves to be the henchmen for legal loan sharks and grifters. I'd get low settlements approved or not try very hard on those type of files bc the people on the other end of the phone were victims and being victimized by the system and unscrupulous companies and the people in them. Why would they pay when they can't collect on paper that is dead? So you didn't get commission bc you sold them the idea it was lucrative to risk even calling that shit. You should have not pulled a mortgage bundle crapfest like what happened in 08 with the mortgage backed securities have "AAA" paper as a small percentage of portfolios when it was really a subprime sandwich and largely had to do with how it was graded from the three bureaus. If you know how to judge the collectibily of a portfolio then you won't be wasting time and payroll of the people you want to collect on it. It was probably 17% fee crap too like some ridiculous auto paper I've seen. Not worth the risk to collect on it.
Those are usually the worst because it's really refusals based on unresolved issues and complaints the business refused to make good on. The worst kind of clients.
I've worked in recieveables for a long time. All aspects of the business and some clients deserve a no. That's the kind of paper, if I were a debt purchaser, I'd pass on, the roi isn't there and it costs more to collect it and isn't worth the payroll or postage as we are wont to say around the watercooler, it's something that you just let sit. Honestly I'd tell my team to focus on something that won't get us sued bc its the client who needs to be.
A good and relatable post. I feel like I made a lot of bad decisions in life as well. I had a call center job for three years. I'm oddly proud of that, since I had that job about ten times as long as the average employee. I ate so much garbage from the company, which would change rules on us on a whim. It didn't matter if you followed the script perfectly, if the company representative didn't like it anymore, it would be considered a strike against you.
They've been hit with two class-action lawsuits since then. I participated in the first and got a nice check of fifty dollars. I took my husband out for dinner.
And yes, I got fat then too. I gained about thirty pounds, which I lost within a year of leaving that job.
Glad you enjoyed the post, and thanks for sharing your experience. A call center does not sound fun. I’m sure you also took garbage from customers and not just your bosses.
Wonderful post. It is very generous of you to share your experience with us, and your advice to young men is excellent. One way to go for the status gold without playing the game is to become a bartender. It pays well, and within the circle of the bar one works at, you have the top status-after all, the bartender controls the booze, lol. Also, it’s a great way to make some decent money while having fun and interacting with all rungs of society while really internalizing the reality that the status wealth game we are conditioned to play in the country is a complete waste of one’s life.
Bartender always seemed like an intriguing gig. Talk about a great way to network!
Then status/wealth game is a symptom of a materialistic society, and I mean that sincerely, that views the acquisition of wealth as not only the single mark of success, but also of morality. It’s sick.
The materialism is a symptom of an even greater societal problem. And bartending is a lot of fun. And-depending on where you tend bar-so many of the people you serve have said to hell with the status wealth game, too!
Lol, well, for some that’s the case. For many, though, the pub is an opportunity to engage on a human level with other people. Rather than saving the money they spend to buy shit they don’t need, they choose to go somewhere they can interact with other real people. It’s a long tradition dating back to the speakeasies, the taverns, the medieval pubs, the wine halls of rome, all the way back to Mesopotamia, I imagine. (I’m sure the east had its own version of such places as well). Many of these people are content with the simple working class lives they have, because they value their friends and family more than whatever garbage is being pushed on us by our corporate overlords.
Industry vet that while not an attorney, I have worked in every aspect except for going before judges. I'm thinking of one sleezebag in particular that I used to know and was at a debt purchaser we both worked at and what he just let my apartment complex illegally do is why people RTP at that point. Thank you for saying this stuff. I feel the same way. I've been in the biz since 00 dude and it go so bad in 09 that I quit for awhile. The last firm I was at along with the last offer I got was my threshold. I can't physically, emotionally, spiritually or psychologically do this job anymore. It has put me into such a state of just flat out not liking who I have to be for a paycheck. It's no wonder why every piece of the backend finance cornucopia has high rates of suicide and addiction. It's so nice to know I'm not alone in feeling this way and feel I must do penance to help others on the other side of it now.
It’s the worst business, at least the worst “legitimate” one. Lawyers ruin society. Almost all congressmen are lawyers; that should tell you a lot. Let them kill themselves and get hooked on drugs. I’m with Dick the Butcher here.
My cousin and I graduated together. He went to law school. I considered it but decided I didn’t want to be in school anymore and his advice was that if I wasn’t certain I wanted to be a lawyer it would probably be a waste of time and money. I think he was probably right. The people I’ve know in it seem to depict it as a soul sucking grind. And many become quite bitter and cynical. My cousin went on to partner with his brother and form a real estate investment company. That is whole nother sad story due to the 08 recession and later on their lives were all but destroyed by unethical state prosecutors, but ultimately exonerated. They are both successful realtors now.
They were the kind of motivated geniuses that were always going to be very successful or end up in jail for being successful but not correctly politically connected or sufficiently corrupt to buy their way out. I always thought if I were an attorney, 2nd amendment and religious rights would be my games. But that ship has sailed. I’m more interested in getting back to the land now. Hands dirty.
In the rural areas, I encountered the lowest of the low on the status totem pole: poor rural whites. Everyone hates them. And yes, it’s hatred, not just “not caring.” Books have been written about how awful this group of people is. Never a thought for why they’re in such bad shape. “We gave them a program but they just don’t vote for us because they’re racist.” Fact is, most everyone was doing poorly. Most of the country looks like those downscale areas and not the cities where the credentialed are doing just fine.
As a child, I grew up in one of those poor Rural Whites. My dad was a farmer, my mother worked for the local paper. They never made more than 15k a year. My dad drove a fully paid-for 15-year-old truck, while my mother drove a fully paid-for 10-year-old car. They built their house and paid 20k cash for it. We bought clothes from the local clothing store, shoes from the shoe store. We wore everything until it was about to fall apart, then we bought new.
Keep in mind, this is on less than 20k a year.
Most of the poor rural whites are living check to check, crop to crop, cow to cow.
It’s just awful how there’s one segment of the population everyone in charge openly wants to eliminate—and I mean that literally; they’d kill all poor whites if they could—and if that group tries to organize around a shared group interest, they’re considered worse than the third Reich. America is insane and must be stopped.
Great article with great advice. The best decision I ever made was choosing money and free time over status after graduating law school. Sure, by working in HR I probably ruined people’s lives even worse than you did but at least I earned double your salary starting.
Gallows humor. I still have a soul and feel empathy for the people whose lives are ruined by being fired, but sometimes I need to make light of things to get through the day.
I actually overall think I am doing good for the world and that every single person I fired deserved it. I work for the Feds, and the standard to get fired is pretty high. The majority stopped showing up to work for 3 months. Some other examples are employees that got in a fight with a customer, sexually assaulted a subordinate, called their boss a racial slur, made a bomb threat, or sent multiple customers to the ER. I’m not purposely picking severe cases, minor cases like stealing from the Agency only gets you a suspension. But I still have enough of a soul to feel something when they are sobbing and telling me their life story of how the war gave them PTSD.
So it was satire then. That or you enjoy playing one side against another, don't know if xyz is true and if you're aiding and abeting mobbing and bullying. I'm going with your a fucking psychopath with pathological personality problems who enjoys the breadcrumbs of power you've been afforded bc you really hate yourself and hide bc you are incapable of honesty and enjoy pulling wings off flies. That's just what I'm picking up.
Great post, with so much that is relatable and sad but true. I love how law schools point to lawyers making their living in bizarre ways (ie., by not being a lawyer) as a selling point -- "You can do *anything* with a law degree" -- but why would you want to if practicing law is so great? The fact that all these law grads were so desperate to escape their legal careers that they invented all these odd ways to make their living didn't strike me as the red flags about Law that they actually were. Live and learn!
One thing exposure to Law gives you is a deeper appreciation for how fundamentally bent and broken our civilization is. There's very little about it that is optimized for human flourishing, and most of it is ingeniously calibrated to promote the opposite (so much cruelty and suffering for the minimal benefit of a very few). You do a great job bringing these (typically) arcane and intangible problems down to earth and making them relatable in terms of their devastating effects on the human soul. And what is worst of all, this evil system appeals to what is potentially good and noble in young people, to get them to buy into the system long enough to get the hook inserted into their mouths, leaving them in the kind of infernal dilemmas you describe.
I thank God I got out of Law, although my current career is relatively low-status and involves a lot of BS make-work (that last part is just like Law though). Non-lawyers often ask, "Why aren't you doing anything with your Law degree?" But interestingly, none of the lawyers I know ask this, nor would they even think to ask this, because they already know why. If they're not already out, they're dreaming of making their escape.
You mention Tucker Max. I wish I had read his essay on why you shouldn't go to law school before I made that mistake, though to be honest, it probably wouldn't have made a difference. I have shared it with a few people who told me they were wanting to go to law school, and in every case, the person went to law school anyway and ... eventually regretted it. So it goes.
We all should’ve read Tucker Max before, and not during, law school! I had a quote of his in my Google profile IN LAW SCHOOL. Friends of mine all thought I wrote it.
“I love how law schools point to lawyers making their living in bizarre ways (ie., by not being a lawyer) as a selling point -- "You can do *anything* with a law degree" -- but why would you want to if practicing law is so great? The fact that all these law grads were so desperate to escape their legal careers that they invented all these odd ways to make their living didn't strike me as the red flags about Law that they actually were. Live and learn!”
Excellent point. I never looked at it that way.
“One thing exposure to Law gives you is a deeper appreciation for how fundamentally bent and broken our civilization is.”
100 percent. I took a family law class. It made me sick and angry in equal measure. So did constitutional law. A week in and it hit me: the constitution is bullshit and literally only means what five-out-of-nine wizards in black robes say it means at any given point in time. I said that to my professor in class one day and she just sheepishly shrugged and nodded.
"A week in and it hit me: the constitution is bullshit and literally only means what five-out-of-nine wizards in black robes say it means at any given point in time."
Exactly. Add to that, you have only the legal rights that the government (in partnership with its private agents) is willing to respect, or that you have the resources and connections needed to sue them successfully and make them respect (at least in your own limited case). It's dead letter wherever it matters most, which is a bit of a blackpill, but it's the truth.
Ditto Odinyus on good advice to young people. I didn’t have clarity on my vocation, fiction writing, until I was 30 but remained in my day job (business/process improvement) for 20 years. And then my writing passion morphed into teaching when I turned 48. God knew, I didn’t. I’ve thoroughly enjoyed 24 years of working with teens and helping them prepare for college and life.
You, sir, are a legend. Good for! Starting something new post-40 in a new career—hell, GETTING A JOB post-40–is no small accomplishment in America. Well done.
I enjoyed reading your article. Honest, insightful, relatable.
I do not envy good men. The mantel they are designed to carry (work, provision, leadership w/ integrity, etc) is large and heavy. Most get caught up in the status, like you mentioned. Too few find peace with fewer digits in their salary and a simple life.
As a wife who is devoted to her husband, I encourage my husband to do work he can find enjoyment in even if that means we drive used cars, have a smaller home, skip out on traveling the world... me and my sons would rather have him with us physically, spiritually, mentally, emotionally. He is too valuable to us to sacrifice himself for a place that will replace him in short order and cares not for his soul.
Thank you for reminding us to look at the WHOLE of a person's life and not just what is right in front of us. We all have a story and we should be eager to learn and appreciate the stories of others.
Thank you for the comment. Too many people don’t see things the way you do. Money = morality in America and it’s a trap that’s easy to fall into because materialism is our unofficial (or is it official?) state religion.
I finished my undergrad in finance at a very good school, and had an interview with a top consulting firm which I *stumbled out of in a fugue* because the idea of working in finance/consulting/whatever was filling me with existential dread.
Graduated into COVID, so there were few jobs and I couldn't/wouldn't do the high finance stuff. I toyed with law school, but never pulled the trigger because the idea of practicing law was *also* giving me panic attacks!
So I'm doing my thing and finally getting my professional footing mid-twenties, but have often wondered if I made a mistake. Whether I should have done my time in IB/consulting/Big Law/whatever, do the 80 hour weeks, and exit on (???) timeline into lucrative, easy work.
So I appreciate you validating my gut on this one. I had the exact same realization; I'm just not built for status-jokeying. I'm not built for the race, for better or for worse. Couldn't be a Gordon Gekko even if I tried, so I'll just, do some other shit.
You made the right choice. If you had existential dread at the thought of working a certain job, like I did, run away. Or you’ll end up like me.
People think you can just turn it in. “You’ve gotta be a SHARK in this business! A BULLDOG.” You are born a hyper-aggressive asshole sociopath or you’re not; such people aren’t made. Never do something you’re not a good fit for. That’s my big piece of advice, of which “Don’t go to law school” is a subset.
This was a wild ride, I remember when I was 19, I took a job at a call center where we sold air for $250 a box to suburban families. It was 2006 and I was being paid $25 an hour untaxed. I hated the job and what we had to do to stay employed, but I needed the money for school
Don't take it personally, we legal aid / public defender types look down our noses at all other lawyers - it's all we have, since there's no money & even the people who skip on their debts think we're worms.
Well, you take your wins where you can. Respect.
This resonates with me. I was a smart kid who didn't take care of his mental health and went off the "smart person" track. I got accepted to Purdue despite not really completing my senior year of high school. Made some stupid choices at Purdue and ended up going to Purdue Calumet (Purdue NW now) in Hammond, IN. Hammond is not a great city and I had to drive 30 min. just to attend. I met people that I never would have if I stayed on the "smart person" track.
Right then I realized what people talk about the Cycle of Poverty. People are not educated enough to "play the game" and any mistake financially or legally ends the game and saddles them with 10's of thousands of dollars of unbankruptable debt. (Student loans can't be bankrupted. Hello usury!) People also got arrested just for having pot in their car which wasn't even theirs. Those days in prison were enough for them to miss several tests and fail those classes. Many people who wanted to graduate and were smart enough to do it, didn't because of this. I could practically write a whole novel about that experience.
So I sympathize with the alternate life path problem. I also made some bad decisions that have really hurt me as well. I also understand what it is to see poor people up close and be forced to understand what they go through. There are huge financial and legal barriers in place to keep the poor people poor and it is there on purpose.
There are many things our system does that gives more to the haves and makes it more difficult on the have-nots. “Hard work is all you need” is bogus. Most people ARE stuck—hello progressive income tax—in the United States, unless you’re part of a client class who gets special favored, or you’re incredibly lucky. That’s the sad truth. Maybe it didn’t used to be like this, but it sure is now.
Yeah, many people who are poor work very hard, the problem is they oftentimes don't work very smart.
Compound that with the fact that regulations and taxes create a financial hump that is very hard to overcome without extreme discipline and hard work.
Yes!
Look forward to reading your law school story next. I was on the other end of the bell curve - I made $125k as a first year (which was nuts, but not that nuts compared to the $180k first years were making about 10 years later). I was blessed. But I had to walk away after about 10 years of Big Law because I didn’t want to keep going down the path that I saw was required to stay in the game. The rates of mental health issues, substance abuse problems, and toxic family dynamics were tragic, in many cases worn like combat ribbons. This was in NYC where guys had coke dealers coming to their offices to make deliveries in between fittings of bespoke suits.
I have some really fond memories of particular things I worked on, but those were the rare bright spots in a dark profession. I walked away and took over a section of a state legal aid program where we helped low income veterans. The best thing I ever did as a lawyer, and it wasn’t really even lawyering, was helping a homeless Vietnam veteran move out of a tent in the woods into housing. And, I got to fight debt collection lawyers and make them spend a lot of time and money proving up chain of title for the debts they bought :)
Like most higher education, prospective customers looking to purchase a law degree so that they can have an entry ticket to the bar exam are lied to about the cost vs reward. Most graduates earn a relative pittance based on what is increasingly a six-figure ante to the game. Large starting salaries at prestigious Big Law firms are what are advertised, but there are precious few of those slots and those firms are built to grind you out and attrit 90% of each first year class in the first 6-10 years.
I have friends who did the big law thing going in, knowing it was temporary and unsustainable and only to pay off the student-loan debts. Which begs the question: why don’t people realize how sick it is that we encourage the accrual of debt to work in soul-crushing jobs just to pay said debt, with the understanding that nobody wants to be in this field in the first place?
Law is the field for those of us who didn’t know what we wanted to do with our lives at the time, but basically had to make a decision. Poor choices lead to poor outcomes, every single time.
My first job out of college was selling debt collection services. I didn't do any collection, but I was a salesman who tried to persuade businesses to sign up and then help them set up and sort accounts. It was 100% commission. I was real good at it for a while, but ultimately I did not get all the money I earned because, irony of ironies, the people trying to collect on others did not want to pay the bill themselves.
That is the least surprising thing I’ve heard all day. Certain business attract certain types, and also I suppose it takes one to know one.
Usually it is contingency and based on the total dollar amount of the placed portfolio and collectibility of the debt. The higher the fee rate the harder it is to collect as well as how many times it was ran through the gauntlet before and how many other places had it. Was it full of disputes or predatory loans, ie sub prime, primary or secondary lender or the dreaded e commerce? Surely you knew if or how likely it was to pay based on assessing these things along with the clients business model you were collecting for to base your selling points on why it was worth anyone's time to even send out the 1st notice. Were there tons of customer service issues? Did the lender just want to beat up customers who couldn't pay or that they rushed through and broke the laws in place to push the debt through instead of work with the consumer. I'll tell you what if it was all of the above the client doesn't get paid unless the agency gets paid and bad business and paper is what we call firesale. Due diligence done and if not it's not worth putting the agency/purchaser/ firm at risk for violations and lawsuits from smart consumers where the collector is at risk themselves to be the henchmen for legal loan sharks and grifters. I'd get low settlements approved or not try very hard on those type of files bc the people on the other end of the phone were victims and being victimized by the system and unscrupulous companies and the people in them. Why would they pay when they can't collect on paper that is dead? So you didn't get commission bc you sold them the idea it was lucrative to risk even calling that shit. You should have not pulled a mortgage bundle crapfest like what happened in 08 with the mortgage backed securities have "AAA" paper as a small percentage of portfolios when it was really a subprime sandwich and largely had to do with how it was graded from the three bureaus. If you know how to judge the collectibily of a portfolio then you won't be wasting time and payroll of the people you want to collect on it. It was probably 17% fee crap too like some ridiculous auto paper I've seen. Not worth the risk to collect on it.
These were unpaid accounts receivable at small businesses. And it was a flat fee letter service, not a portion of the total amount.
Those are usually the worst because it's really refusals based on unresolved issues and complaints the business refused to make good on. The worst kind of clients.
I've worked in recieveables for a long time. All aspects of the business and some clients deserve a no. That's the kind of paper, if I were a debt purchaser, I'd pass on, the roi isn't there and it costs more to collect it and isn't worth the payroll or postage as we are wont to say around the watercooler, it's something that you just let sit. Honestly I'd tell my team to focus on something that won't get us sued bc its the client who needs to be.
A good and relatable post. I feel like I made a lot of bad decisions in life as well. I had a call center job for three years. I'm oddly proud of that, since I had that job about ten times as long as the average employee. I ate so much garbage from the company, which would change rules on us on a whim. It didn't matter if you followed the script perfectly, if the company representative didn't like it anymore, it would be considered a strike against you.
They've been hit with two class-action lawsuits since then. I participated in the first and got a nice check of fifty dollars. I took my husband out for dinner.
And yes, I got fat then too. I gained about thirty pounds, which I lost within a year of leaving that job.
Glad you enjoyed the post, and thanks for sharing your experience. A call center does not sound fun. I’m sure you also took garbage from customers and not just your bosses.
Wonderful post. It is very generous of you to share your experience with us, and your advice to young men is excellent. One way to go for the status gold without playing the game is to become a bartender. It pays well, and within the circle of the bar one works at, you have the top status-after all, the bartender controls the booze, lol. Also, it’s a great way to make some decent money while having fun and interacting with all rungs of society while really internalizing the reality that the status wealth game we are conditioned to play in the country is a complete waste of one’s life.
Bartender always seemed like an intriguing gig. Talk about a great way to network!
Then status/wealth game is a symptom of a materialistic society, and I mean that sincerely, that views the acquisition of wealth as not only the single mark of success, but also of morality. It’s sick.
The materialism is a symptom of an even greater societal problem. And bartending is a lot of fun. And-depending on where you tend bar-so many of the people you serve have said to hell with the status wealth game, too!
So they drink instead 🤣
Lol, well, for some that’s the case. For many, though, the pub is an opportunity to engage on a human level with other people. Rather than saving the money they spend to buy shit they don’t need, they choose to go somewhere they can interact with other real people. It’s a long tradition dating back to the speakeasies, the taverns, the medieval pubs, the wine halls of rome, all the way back to Mesopotamia, I imagine. (I’m sure the east had its own version of such places as well). Many of these people are content with the simple working class lives they have, because they value their friends and family more than whatever garbage is being pushed on us by our corporate overlords.
Industry vet that while not an attorney, I have worked in every aspect except for going before judges. I'm thinking of one sleezebag in particular that I used to know and was at a debt purchaser we both worked at and what he just let my apartment complex illegally do is why people RTP at that point. Thank you for saying this stuff. I feel the same way. I've been in the biz since 00 dude and it go so bad in 09 that I quit for awhile. The last firm I was at along with the last offer I got was my threshold. I can't physically, emotionally, spiritually or psychologically do this job anymore. It has put me into such a state of just flat out not liking who I have to be for a paycheck. It's no wonder why every piece of the backend finance cornucopia has high rates of suicide and addiction. It's so nice to know I'm not alone in feeling this way and feel I must do penance to help others on the other side of it now.
It’s the worst business, at least the worst “legitimate” one. Lawyers ruin society. Almost all congressmen are lawyers; that should tell you a lot. Let them kill themselves and get hooked on drugs. I’m with Dick the Butcher here.
My cousin and I graduated together. He went to law school. I considered it but decided I didn’t want to be in school anymore and his advice was that if I wasn’t certain I wanted to be a lawyer it would probably be a waste of time and money. I think he was probably right. The people I’ve know in it seem to depict it as a soul sucking grind. And many become quite bitter and cynical. My cousin went on to partner with his brother and form a real estate investment company. That is whole nother sad story due to the 08 recession and later on their lives were all but destroyed by unethical state prosecutors, but ultimately exonerated. They are both successful realtors now.
I’m glad they found success in a different field . . . and I’m very happy indeed to hear that you avoided going to law school! GOOD life choice!
They were the kind of motivated geniuses that were always going to be very successful or end up in jail for being successful but not correctly politically connected or sufficiently corrupt to buy their way out. I always thought if I were an attorney, 2nd amendment and religious rights would be my games. But that ship has sailed. I’m more interested in getting back to the land now. Hands dirty.
The only way to “change the world” with the law is for the worse. The ratchet only goes in one direction.
In the rural areas, I encountered the lowest of the low on the status totem pole: poor rural whites. Everyone hates them. And yes, it’s hatred, not just “not caring.” Books have been written about how awful this group of people is. Never a thought for why they’re in such bad shape. “We gave them a program but they just don’t vote for us because they’re racist.” Fact is, most everyone was doing poorly. Most of the country looks like those downscale areas and not the cities where the credentialed are doing just fine.
As a child, I grew up in one of those poor Rural Whites. My dad was a farmer, my mother worked for the local paper. They never made more than 15k a year. My dad drove a fully paid-for 15-year-old truck, while my mother drove a fully paid-for 10-year-old car. They built their house and paid 20k cash for it. We bought clothes from the local clothing store, shoes from the shoe store. We wore everything until it was about to fall apart, then we bought new.
Keep in mind, this is on less than 20k a year.
Most of the poor rural whites are living check to check, crop to crop, cow to cow.
I'd rather live among them than live in a city.
It’s just awful how there’s one segment of the population everyone in charge openly wants to eliminate—and I mean that literally; they’d kill all poor whites if they could—and if that group tries to organize around a shared group interest, they’re considered worse than the third Reich. America is insane and must be stopped.
Great article with great advice. The best decision I ever made was choosing money and free time over status after graduating law school. Sure, by working in HR I probably ruined people’s lives even worse than you did but at least I earned double your salary starting.
I have to laugh at that.
Was this satire? Do you have no soul?
Gallows humor. I still have a soul and feel empathy for the people whose lives are ruined by being fired, but sometimes I need to make light of things to get through the day.
I actually overall think I am doing good for the world and that every single person I fired deserved it. I work for the Feds, and the standard to get fired is pretty high. The majority stopped showing up to work for 3 months. Some other examples are employees that got in a fight with a customer, sexually assaulted a subordinate, called their boss a racial slur, made a bomb threat, or sent multiple customers to the ER. I’m not purposely picking severe cases, minor cases like stealing from the Agency only gets you a suspension. But I still have enough of a soul to feel something when they are sobbing and telling me their life story of how the war gave them PTSD.
So it was satire then. That or you enjoy playing one side against another, don't know if xyz is true and if you're aiding and abeting mobbing and bullying. I'm going with your a fucking psychopath with pathological personality problems who enjoys the breadcrumbs of power you've been afforded bc you really hate yourself and hide bc you are incapable of honesty and enjoy pulling wings off flies. That's just what I'm picking up.
Nah, I took it as intended.
Great post, with so much that is relatable and sad but true. I love how law schools point to lawyers making their living in bizarre ways (ie., by not being a lawyer) as a selling point -- "You can do *anything* with a law degree" -- but why would you want to if practicing law is so great? The fact that all these law grads were so desperate to escape their legal careers that they invented all these odd ways to make their living didn't strike me as the red flags about Law that they actually were. Live and learn!
One thing exposure to Law gives you is a deeper appreciation for how fundamentally bent and broken our civilization is. There's very little about it that is optimized for human flourishing, and most of it is ingeniously calibrated to promote the opposite (so much cruelty and suffering for the minimal benefit of a very few). You do a great job bringing these (typically) arcane and intangible problems down to earth and making them relatable in terms of their devastating effects on the human soul. And what is worst of all, this evil system appeals to what is potentially good and noble in young people, to get them to buy into the system long enough to get the hook inserted into their mouths, leaving them in the kind of infernal dilemmas you describe.
I thank God I got out of Law, although my current career is relatively low-status and involves a lot of BS make-work (that last part is just like Law though). Non-lawyers often ask, "Why aren't you doing anything with your Law degree?" But interestingly, none of the lawyers I know ask this, nor would they even think to ask this, because they already know why. If they're not already out, they're dreaming of making their escape.
You mention Tucker Max. I wish I had read his essay on why you shouldn't go to law school before I made that mistake, though to be honest, it probably wouldn't have made a difference. I have shared it with a few people who told me they were wanting to go to law school, and in every case, the person went to law school anyway and ... eventually regretted it. So it goes.
We all should’ve read Tucker Max before, and not during, law school! I had a quote of his in my Google profile IN LAW SCHOOL. Friends of mine all thought I wrote it.
“I love how law schools point to lawyers making their living in bizarre ways (ie., by not being a lawyer) as a selling point -- "You can do *anything* with a law degree" -- but why would you want to if practicing law is so great? The fact that all these law grads were so desperate to escape their legal careers that they invented all these odd ways to make their living didn't strike me as the red flags about Law that they actually were. Live and learn!”
Excellent point. I never looked at it that way.
“One thing exposure to Law gives you is a deeper appreciation for how fundamentally bent and broken our civilization is.”
100 percent. I took a family law class. It made me sick and angry in equal measure. So did constitutional law. A week in and it hit me: the constitution is bullshit and literally only means what five-out-of-nine wizards in black robes say it means at any given point in time. I said that to my professor in class one day and she just sheepishly shrugged and nodded.
"A week in and it hit me: the constitution is bullshit and literally only means what five-out-of-nine wizards in black robes say it means at any given point in time."
Exactly. Add to that, you have only the legal rights that the government (in partnership with its private agents) is willing to respect, or that you have the resources and connections needed to sue them successfully and make them respect (at least in your own limited case). It's dead letter wherever it matters most, which is a bit of a blackpill, but it's the truth.
Correct. Rights are not “God-given.” They’re state-given. The sooner we understand that, the better.
Ditto Odinyus on good advice to young people. I didn’t have clarity on my vocation, fiction writing, until I was 30 but remained in my day job (business/process improvement) for 20 years. And then my writing passion morphed into teaching when I turned 48. God knew, I didn’t. I’ve thoroughly enjoyed 24 years of working with teens and helping them prepare for college and life.
You, sir, are a legend. Good for! Starting something new post-40 in a new career—hell, GETTING A JOB post-40–is no small accomplishment in America. Well done.
Good consultants add value. It’s just a shame there are so few of us.
I enjoyed reading your article. Honest, insightful, relatable.
I do not envy good men. The mantel they are designed to carry (work, provision, leadership w/ integrity, etc) is large and heavy. Most get caught up in the status, like you mentioned. Too few find peace with fewer digits in their salary and a simple life.
As a wife who is devoted to her husband, I encourage my husband to do work he can find enjoyment in even if that means we drive used cars, have a smaller home, skip out on traveling the world... me and my sons would rather have him with us physically, spiritually, mentally, emotionally. He is too valuable to us to sacrifice himself for a place that will replace him in short order and cares not for his soul.
Thank you for reminding us to look at the WHOLE of a person's life and not just what is right in front of us. We all have a story and we should be eager to learn and appreciate the stories of others.
Thank you for the comment. Too many people don’t see things the way you do. Money = morality in America and it’s a trap that’s easy to fall into because materialism is our unofficial (or is it official?) state religion.
I finished my undergrad in finance at a very good school, and had an interview with a top consulting firm which I *stumbled out of in a fugue* because the idea of working in finance/consulting/whatever was filling me with existential dread.
Graduated into COVID, so there were few jobs and I couldn't/wouldn't do the high finance stuff. I toyed with law school, but never pulled the trigger because the idea of practicing law was *also* giving me panic attacks!
So I'm doing my thing and finally getting my professional footing mid-twenties, but have often wondered if I made a mistake. Whether I should have done my time in IB/consulting/Big Law/whatever, do the 80 hour weeks, and exit on (???) timeline into lucrative, easy work.
So I appreciate you validating my gut on this one. I had the exact same realization; I'm just not built for status-jokeying. I'm not built for the race, for better or for worse. Couldn't be a Gordon Gekko even if I tried, so I'll just, do some other shit.
You made the right choice. If you had existential dread at the thought of working a certain job, like I did, run away. Or you’ll end up like me.
People think you can just turn it in. “You’ve gotta be a SHARK in this business! A BULLDOG.” You are born a hyper-aggressive asshole sociopath or you’re not; such people aren’t made. Never do something you’re not a good fit for. That’s my big piece of advice, of which “Don’t go to law school” is a subset.
This was a wild ride, I remember when I was 19, I took a job at a call center where we sold air for $250 a box to suburban families. It was 2006 and I was being paid $25 an hour untaxed. I hated the job and what we had to do to stay employed, but I needed the money for school
Air? Like, literal air? Do tell.
Also, $25/hour in almost $40 now. Dang.
We would send them a box of 200 packets full of air. It was $2.60 per air packet. We would offer them a free “refurbished” (broken) iPod shuffle.
Ah so air for packing?