kansmith

lolha

Here is an article from NY Times:
http://www.nytimes.com/2007/08/21/bu...ss&oref=slogin

...The nearly 90 percent of Americans who make less than $100,000 a year saved on average $318 each on their investments. They collected 5.3 percent of the total savings from reduced tax rates on investment income.

The I.R.S. data showed that the number of Americans making less than $25,000 a year shrank, down by 3.2 million, or 5.5 percent.

Nearly half of Americans reported incomes of less than $30,000, and two-thirds make less than $50,000.

The number of taxpayers making more than $100,000 grew by nearly 3.4 million and accounted for more than two-thirds of the growth in the number of returns filed in 2005 compared with those in 2000.

The fact that average incomes remained lower in 2005 than five years earlier helps explain why so many Americans report feeling economic stress despite overall growth in the economy. Many Americans are also paying a larger share of their health care costs and have had their retirement benefits reduced, adding to their out-of-pocket costs.

The White House noted that during the same five years, income tax rates have been cut under a series of laws sponsored by President Bush. Mr. Bush has delivered a steady stream of upbeat assessments of the economy, saying last fall, for example, pleased with the economic progress were making.

Tony Fratto, a White House spokesman, attributed the drop in average incomes to the significant wrenching hits that our economy took in 2001 and 2002, so no one should be surprised that what a bubble economy created in the late 1990s and 2000, where economic data were skewed, would take some time to recover.

Mr. Fratto said the fact that nearly all of the growth in incomes was among those in the upper reaches of the income ladder and that the majority of investment tax breaks went to those making more than $1 million is not a very interesting story.

here is no question that you will always have distributional concerns with a tax rate, a broad-based tax rate, at the very top of the income scale, Mr. Fratto said.

He said the more significant issue was the reduction in taxes for middle-class Americans that Mr. Bush won from Congress.

Robert S. McIntyre, the director of Citizens for Tax Justice, said that even though he expected a few very wealthy people to reap most of the tax savings generated by lower tax rates on dividends and capital gains, the size of the savings still takes your breath away.

He said the tax savings at the top, combined with lower average incomes after five years, shows that trickle down doesn't work.

ccmic

Median Salary of different law schools

I found this chart listing the median salary of different law schools in the states. Cool data

http://www.deloggio.com/usnews/medians.htm

funtocry

actually, more than half make less than 62,000; bottom quarter makes 40-55K, and top quarter makes 100K

Here is an article you have to read (with distribution chart and everything)

http://www.elsblog.org/the_empirical...bution-of.html

Source:http://www.elsblog.org/the_empirical...bution-of.html

harryp

July 25, 2007, 11:25PM from http://chron.com/disp/story.mpl/business/5000104.html
Salary reality: Many lawyers don't earn big bucks

People have a false impression about lawyers � that they all make six-figure salaries.

With at least three big law firms in Houston announcing this month that they're raising starting pay to $160,000, there's reason for the confusion.

But the reality is that first-year graduates from the three Houston law schools make as little as $30,000 a year and have a median salary of around $70,000.

Those outside the profession aren't the only ones with unrealistic impressions of lawyer pay.

A lot of law students, seduced by publicity about high-end salaries and some wishful thinking, aren't grounded about legal salaries either.

"Every student thinks they are going to be in the top 5 percent of the class and make $150,000. The reality is they are not. If the grades are not there, the money does not follow," said Andreaus Boise, career service coordinator for the Thurgood Marshall
School of Law at Texas Southern University.

Students get upset about this often enough that Boise keeps Rolaids on her desk for them. Another law school career adviser says she keeps tissues on her desk for the inevitable tears.

Feeling the curve
The top salaries go to law students from the prestige schools or those who have the very best grades at other schools.


Others, even some who have enjoyed earlier academic success, might need to lower their expectations.

"These students have done well their whole life. This is the first time for a lot of them that they feel a forced curve," said Rhonda Beassie, assistant dean of career development at the University of Houston Law Center. "A healthy percentage of the students don't get the message until they go bid for a job."

The law students who go to the top-tier firms will make $120,000 to $165,000 annually, but that will be the top 10 percent or less, according to the local law school career offices. Those in midsize firms will make roughly $55,000 to $80,000. At small firms or government jobs, they get $40,000 to $60,000. Solo practitioners may make $30,000 or even live off loans when they start out.

Certainly with experience, these lawyers should increase their income and eventually most of them will get past $100,000, but not that far past it. The median income or 50th percentile, for all attorneys in Texas was $113,300 in 2005, the last time the State Bar of Texas conducted its survey.

In the Houston area, the Bar found the median income for probate and estate attorneys was $78,333, for real estate lawyers it was $88,750, and for civil trial lawyers it was $187,500.

The price of going solo
"Students who go out and get a first-year salary of $45,000 are blown away. Their expectations were glamorized," said Reginald Green, the assistant dean of career resources at South Texas College of Law.


The median income for members of the South Texas class of 2006 is $70,000, and the average is $82,000, he said their survey shows.

Green said expectations may be inflated because law schools market themselves in the brightest light and the media cover the highest salaries.

Boise said the TSU law school produces many solo practitioners.

"A lot of students hang out their own shingle. They go to the courthouse to get court appointments. They start at $35,000, sometimes more, sometimes less," she said.

A fresh start
Melissa Lanier and her law partner, Elizabeth Pagel, graduated from TSU law school in May 2006 and they set up a partnership in Humble � Lanier & Pagel. Their first-year income will probably be about $30,000 each, tops.


"We think we are doing well. We thought there might be no money in our own pocket for a year or two," said Lanier, who practices bankruptcy law, while Pagel focuses on family law.

....


"The people at the top of the class were really driven to be there. But I work about 50 hours a week. I'm not working their 80 hours a week," said Lanvin, 27. "I get to hang with my fiance, have a nice dinner, live a little."

Ryan Peterson, a May 2006 graduate of South Texas, makes about $50,000 doing mostly traffic court work for the Citizen Law Firm.

"No question that there are some people who go to law school thinking they'll get $100,000 at their first job even though they can't argue their way out of a paper bag," said Peterson, 28, who would like to move to more serious criminal cases.

harryp

Above the law just posted bonuses from Cravath, Swaine & Moore: