文档介绍：L EGAL STUDIES RESEARCH PAPER SERIES Working Paper Number 07-28 November 1, 2007 Walking the Path of the La w: How Yale Law School Graduates Navigate Career Choices Deborah Cantrell University of Colorado Law School This paper can be downloaded without charge from the Social Science Research Network electronic library at: /abstract=1026618 W ALKING THE PATH OF THE L AW : H OW YALE LAW S CHOOL G RADUATES N AVIGATE CAREER C HOICES Deborah J. Cantrell, Elizabeth Levy Paluck, Heather Lord & April Smith ? ABSTRACT If one talks to law students about the their career expectations, one is likely to he ar mon story: when the student graduates, she plans to go into private practice, or possibly take a government job, or even le ss probably, take a public interest job. The students think their initia l choices of legal jobs set them on a career trajectory that is fa irly immutable. However, the students’ beliefs may not be base d on actual information about how lawyers choose their career paths. This empirical study of 2800 lawyers who graduated from law school between 1970 and 1999 anal yzes whether lawyers have standard career trajectories. Th e study considers whether gender or time of graduation affects career choices. The study also examines whether there are dominant reasons that lawyers give for changing jobs. Finally, th e study considers whether lawyers are satisfied with their jobs by using a unique measure that gauges the level of congruency between lawyers’ hopes for the kind of job they have with their actual experiences of a job. Consistent with other empi rical studies of lawyers’ career paths, this study finds that a la rge number of lawyers start their careers in private practice, and that most lawyers will change jobs a couple of times, with most staying within the same practice setting (., moving from private firm to private firm.) However, this study challenges other well-h