The stats are misleading. Although many retain their licenses, the majority of U.S. lawyers quit practicing within five years of graduating from law school. For example, the majority of all law students today are women. Mommy track will hit within a few years of graduating from law school...most will never return to practicing law full-time. For males, many will take jobs in a corporate environment or start up their own businesses. They'll keep their licenses but really aren't engaged in the practice of law.
- In my country, Sweden, the situation is pretty much the same. Generally speaking, most of the students at Swedish universities are female, while most of the graduates are male. 90% of all Swedish professors are men.
I don’t know exactly what the situation’s like in Europe in general, although I suspect the situation is very similar to the one here in Sweden.
“For males, many will take jobs in a corporate environment or start up their own businesses. They’ll keep their licenses but really aren’t engaged in the practice of law.”
- Perhaps this phenomena is more common in the US than over here in Europe, but a lot of our lawyers end up as politicians, business owners and such things too.
However, my personal impression is that Europe suffers from a larger overabundance of sheer bureaucrats than the US does, while the US has a larger percentage of its workforce tied up in unnecessary lawsuits compared to Europe.
While a certain amount of lawyers and bureaucrats are needed in all advanced societies, what both the US and Europe really need more of is competent inventors, entrepreneurs, engineers and scientists.
Or, as many point out, they only went to Law School so they could be the larval form of a politician.