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Is law school worth it? At 33 low-tier schools, median income after student debt is $55K or below

By Debra Cassens Weiss

June 26, 2024, 1:09 pm CDT

Student debt is still taking a big bite out of lawyer earnings four years after law school graduation, especially at law schools with the lowest return on investment, according to a study by Georgetown University’s Center on Education and the Workforce.

Four years after graduation, median income after student debt payments is “a comfortable—if not extravagant—$72,000,” the report says. But there is “a vast gulf in outcomes between graduates of top law schools and those on the bottom.”

At the upper end of the spectrum, graduates of 26 law schools had median earnings of at least $100,000 four years after graduation, after accounting for student debt. At the low end, graduates of 33 law schools earned less than $55,000 net of student debt at the four-year mark, according to a June 25 press release summarizing the findings.

The study ranked 186 law schools based on graduates’ earnings four years after graduation. It is titled A Law Degree Is No Sure Thing: Some Law School Graduates Earn Top Dollar, But Many Do Not.

The law schools with median earnings net of debt payments above $200,000 after four years are:

1. Columbia University, $253,800 net earnings
2. The University of Pennsylvania, $238,000 net earnings
3. The University of Chicago, $230,700 net earnings
4. Cornell University, $227,100 net earnings
5. Stanford University, $227,100 net earnings (ranked below Cornell University because of slightly lower pay before debt)
6. Harvard University, $220,900 net earnings
7. Northwestern University, $206,700 net earnings

Law schools at the bottom of the rankings had median earnings net of debt payments below $40,000 after four years. They are:

  181. The Appalachian School of Law, $35,600 net earnings

  182. Faulkner University, $35,200 net earnings

  183. The Thomas M. Cooley Law School, $33,200 net earnings

  184. Atlanta’s John Marshall Law School, $32,100 net earnings

  185. The Inter American University of Puerto Rico School of Law, $29,000 net earnings

  186. Pontifical Catholic University of Puerto Rico, $22,000 net earnings

The median debt burden for graduates leaving law school is $118,500, the study says. The full ranking is at page 63 of the report.

Hat tip to Law.com and Reuters, which had coverage of the report.