To be surprised how posh most lawyers are?

[eggtat]

I grew up in a mining area in the north east. Not a poor background but parents never had much money. I was the clever kid in school, worked my socks off and got a law degree from cambridge. Then moved to London for work.

I thought that law firms would be full of people like me and some posh people. In my office I’d say a an overwhelming majority of people come from what I’d consider a posh background - parents who are professors, diplomats, barristers, partners at law firms, senior accountants etc.

People who grew up privileged, good private schools, academic households, then onto a top uni.

“I’m sure most people can imagine the classic ‘well-spoken, privately educated, pinstriped-suit-wearing doctor’ and although improving the social diversity of the medical workforce has been a focus for the government over the past ten years, data suggests little has changed. The 2012 government report Fair access to professional careers showed medicine had made little progress in widening access to those from disadvantaged backgrounds, and appeared to have little interest in doing so. In 2015 the BMA highlighted that although there was increasing diversity in gender, ethnicity and age, there continued to be minimal improvement in social diversity. A year later the Social Mobility Commission found that only 4 per cent of doctors came from working class backgrounds, behind other groups considered to be ones of privilege, such as lawyers and journalists at 6 and 11 per cent respectively.”

It's not that people from certain backgrounds are "stupid", not at all - it's that we aren't brought up with expectations to "aim higher".

It’s a middle class career, same as the field iI’m in. (psychology) so I feel your pain. It was a culture shock for me.

It's not that people from certain backgrounds are "stupid", not at all - it's that we aren't brought up with expectations to "aim higher"

sadly it’s not even this. It’s that many in positions of seniority don’t want working class people to succeed. Boys club innit. If they have to let the women in, at least make sure they’re posh

It depends in where you live and the size and type of firm. Small local firms near us in a rural area are very different to London firms and there are a mixture of backgrounds.

Average solicitor salaries are very different too - £88k in London and £46k in the Midlands.

Utter boileaux. My DH did and 35+ years later still has a Yorkshire accent, albeit fainter than it was then. Grandfather a miner, father an engineer, mother a teacher. He went to a comp before Oxford.

We all have to start somewhere.x1@

I mean, this has been the status quo for decades. It’s horribly unfair but you’d have to have been living under a rock not to notice this prior. It’s sociology 101.

Twenty years ago I ran shitscared from my (Russell Group) uni careers fair after speaking to mega posh person after mega posh person representing law firms. Until that point I was really interested in pursuing a legal career, although my bachelor's degree was in something else.
I was the first in my family to go to uni too and thought there'd be lots like me in the various professions. How wrong was I.
Twenty years on - and not in a legal career - I still feel like the outlier in terms of background. When peers are off on six month sabbaticals or buying BTL properties or simply fitting right in at some event I remember that it's because they inherited a fuckton/have always mixed in these circles/don't worry about failure.
Class is the last, great, divide in this country and the struggle ordinary, working class, kids face to get to the top is indescribable.
Keep working hard and soon your resilience and determination will help you through.

This couldn't be more different to me.

Crap state school. Average ex-poly uni via a period of working in financial services (not in London). Third in my large family to go to university. Paid my own LPC fees, got a training contract at a magic circle firm. Live in a not posh part of South London and have one child. There are plenty of people out there like me, and I see more coming up through the ranks since the introduction of the SQE. The profession is changing and the lawyers you know are absolutely not the norm anymore.

This. I saw a programme about it a while ago. If you don’t know someone with influence, you’re stuck.

It's pretty much impossible to graduate from Cambridge with a Law degree and be surprised by such a thing. :) Also, do you really have time at work to discuss your family trees? Because I find this highly unlikely.

You are so right. In my department of probably 50 professionals (and we are not even that well-paid) I can only think of around 5 people whose parents were in manual occupations. I’ve been there literally decades so have institutional knowledge. The recruitment pipeline is changing in terms of ethnic diversity but not much in terms of socio economic background.

@OdeToBarney did you have good academics?

So you're in a magic circle sort of firm? You're meant to be bright, why are you surprised?

Go to a mid range firm in the provinces and the lawyers won't be all posh.

You obviously weren't comparing like for like with salaries.

The City law firms in London (who also have regional offices outside London with similar salaries) artificially inflate the average London lawyer salary.

Only a minority of London lawyers work for the City firms.

Most work for high street firms - with average salaries the same as the figure you quoted for the Midlands. And with higher house prices in London, the average lawyer would be better off in the Midlands.

Area of law makes a difference to salary but that's true wherever in the UK the lawyer is based.

@CraftyNavySeal your comment is right re social mobility one generation on; I agree.

They were fine. Not amazing, but I worked my arse off and demonstrated maturity, determination and good commercial awareness.

Eh?

I'm my previous post my mention of salaries was based on private sector high street law firms, where (outside of the minority who work for City law firms) salaries in and outside London are around the same. So, taking into account house prices, lawyers are on average worse off in London.

As a different example, with a higher salary, here's the tiny difference between London and outside London. That extra £2,906 a year in no way compensates for the extortionate London house prices.

https://www.electoralcommission.org.uk/about-us/working-us/vacancy-lawyer

London Salary: £62,906 / Outside London: £60,711.

I think you'll find that Barristers' Chambers are much more diverse than you think. I have come across 4 barristers in the last 20 years; 2 in London and 2 in the North.

1 no law contacts, disabled, northern comprehensive, parents (not graduates or professional) not Oxbridge
2 no law contacts, northern comprehensive Oxbridge, parents graduate teachers
3 no law contacts, privately educated, parents in medicine not Oxbridge.
4 no law contacts, northern comprehensive, northern uni, parents left school at 16, low paid admin.

What they had in common was drive and a tremendous work ethic so a plethora of volunteering, pro bono work etc etc and I guess the confidence their academic results etc gave them eg Firsts, academic prizes, scholarships etc etc.

Chambers often advertise work experience (mini pupillage) on their web pages and pay expenses for overnight stay, travel and provide lunches. They select and mark applications for pupillage etc in several stages by different people and 'blind' ie no names, ages, details etc to eliminate favouritism / prejudice etc.

At one random Chambers eg 15% are disabled, 65% educated at a state school, 50% first generation Uni educated. 50% of Juniors ie not KCs are women.

(If you know anyone who wants to break into a career in law ( or other professions) the Sutton Trust runs free residential and on line courses etc for year 12s.)

Interestingly, albeit according to just one job agency's website rather than actual law firms own websites, average salaries for family solicitors (I picked that area of law to compare salaries just as an example) are higher outside London.

London it says the average is £56,667. It then lists
Top-paying locations for Family Solicitor jobs

Top seems to be Barry in South Glamorgan at £119,333, followed by Grimsby at £95,000.

That said across the UK, London or outside London, many family solicitors are on around £35-50K. Perhaps the job website has inaccurate figures based only on jobs advertises through them.

https://www.reed.co.uk/average-salary/average-family-solicitor-salary-in-london

😂😂😂

I didn't give much thought to it (other than expecting that to study law required many years and therefore money) but follow someone who has just qualified as a barrister and been open about the new/ongoing costs she's facing now, as someone from a low-income background. I was surprised - I did kind of assume once you qualified then that was it, bring on the cases (and high pay).

I'm in my 50s and in my experience it depends on the firm and type of law of course. Criminal defence versus in house corporate/tax civil litigation etc etc some do those are very skewed upper middle class (nothing above that I would say) with others less so. Certainly some are paid a LOT less than others and have far less glamorous jobs.