An Extension of Kennedy's Criticism

As a current law school applicant, I would like to take Kennedy’s criticism of schools one step further in regards to the recruitment process. Most schools use median salaries while preying on the type of students Kennedy describes as striving to achieve a higher social status via law school. For sake of example, I will use Penn State, a very respectable law school. The most recent median salary I could find (it was left off of the employment page this year) is from 2007 and is an attractive $100,000. The first tactic of such schools, is the assumption many students make that this applies to the entire graduating class, when it is actually just the most profitable private sector. Second, closer observation reveals that in fact only about 1/3 of the class enters said field, and one could safely assume that the majority are from the 1/3 of the class as is reflected by salary. Finally, it is also important to note that a median allows for wide disparities in the sample space (i.e. as long as 50% is below the median it does not matter HOW FAR they are below it). The National Law Journal reports that during the legal boom times of 2005, only about 9/181 Penn State graduates landed in NLJ250 firms, which supply the vast majority of coveted $130,000 salaries for recent graduates. Thus, about 30 graduates fall between the median and the ceiling. An analysis of salary dispersions in the field of law reveals that almost all graduates either make about $40,000 or the above NLJ250 standard. Therefore, the chance of a Penn State graduate making the median or higher is at best 19% and at the tuition-price of approximately $120,000 this seems absurdly predatory in my opinion.