I am cross- posting a discussion between Dean Paul McGreal and Professor Michele Pistone from “LinkedIn.” in this posting, they discuss Baumol’s cost disease and the report of the ABA Taskforce on Future of Legal education during yesterdays ABA Meeting. Dean McGreal wonders if folks would be interested in a symposium on this topic.
“Open Meeting of the Council of the ABA Section on Legal Education and Admission to the Bar
There was a fascinating discussion as Justice Randall Shepard (ret.) reported an update by the Task Force on the Future of Legal Education. Justice Shephard reported that the Task Force was likely to address the rising cost of legal education, the lack of adequate preparation of law school graduates for practice, and the possibility of allowing two-year (sixty credit) legal education. A Council member then remarked that the Task Force seems to be moving in the direction of recommending that law schools do more, in less time, and at lower cost. This has been the main problem with most discussions of legal education over the last decade or so — the failure to recognize the cross-purposes and tensions in the resulting prescriptions. The only way to move forward is to finally address Baumol’s cost disease, and no one in the mainstream discussions is talking about this.
- 2 comments
Michele Pistone • Paul, you are exactly right. The Baumol’s cost disease is a real issue and no one seems to be addressing it. I recently sent out to law reviews an article about legal education reform that hopes to help get a discussion started on this exact point.
Paul McGreal • If you find an interested law review, let me know! I am interested in organizing a conference on the topic, and I’d be happy to talk to anyone with a similar interest.
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