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They're not.

Median lawyer rates are more like $200-300/h, with variations depending on locality--a lawyer in NYC is going to be much more expensive than a lawyer in middle-of-nowhere, Kentucky.

As for why they're expensive, part of the answer is because legal training (i.e., law school) is expensive, and lawyers have to pay their student debt.

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My understanding of the price/scarcity dynamics here are that people want lawyers with significant experience, there are a relatively small number of openings every year for BigLaw associates that provide access to that kind of experience, and they hire almost exclusively from the T14 schools.

If you want a random lawyer, you can get them very cheap. But if you're doing M&A or serious corp litigation, you're looking at a much smaller and more expensive pool of candidates. I was shocked by how much our M&A lawyers cost.

All this is to say: the median might not be telling most of the story here.

Lawyer rates are extremely high variance, and the NYT is not hiring anywhere near the median. White shoe firms break $1000/hr routinely.

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