Dedicated to my Mom; the most judgmental person I know.
Copyright © 2000. All Rights Reserved.
A Dollar Don't Know Who Owns It
First Year Lawyers Earn $104,000 plus bonuses. As an all-hubris law school graduate in 1986, I joined an 80-person Fancy Firm for $50,000 annually. Like Groucho musing about a private club that would have him as a member, I laughed at my employers, and wondered how they could justify this outrageous sum. Once I had enough clients, I left the firm because I felt I was underpaid.
Now, given the Internet and our pigs-get-fat-hogs-get slaughtered Digital Economy, snot-nosed know-nothing first-year associates at Fancy Firms command north of $100,000 per year, plus "sweat - bonuses," "standard bonuses," "boom-year bonuses," and the like. This, of course, is all a ploy by the Fancy Firms to attract the "talent" who might otherwise be lulled into the false sense of security that Dot.Com or other Fancy Clients might otherwise offer them if the Fancy Firms don't snap them up first.
This makes perfect economic sense. The Fancy Firm creates a mercenary class of young people who have no sense of their intrinsic value; it exposes them, these days, to its high-tech Fancy Clients who are oozing with venture capitalists' cash. Ultimately, a handful of these Fancy Clients will offer a handful of the Fancy Firms' younger lawyers more money than the firm is willing to pay, and they will leave. But this is good for the firm, because often it is the second-tier, non-partnership track lawyers who are lured away. All the while, the Fancy Firm has charged its Fancy Client as much money as it possibly can, knowing the client will pay the freight with the venture capitalists' money. And, best of all, once the lawyers who have been lured away are comfortably settled in their new Fancy Client digs, it is those lawyers who will be responsible for hiring and continuing to retain the Fancy Firm, and who will pay the Fancy Firms' fancy fees.
There's Only Two Ways to Be In this World: Rich or Poor. So, You Might As Well be Rich.
"I can't think of another business where employees would feel justified questioning a bonus from management," quipped an unidentified and obsequious associate of Dickstein Shapiro Morin & Oshinsky, quoted in When a Paycheck is Not Enough, Law News Network, Jan. 4, 2000, www.lawnewsnetwork.com/stories/A12617-2000Jan3.html.
Damn, you're a lawyer! Of course you should feel justified questioning a bonus, and every other management decision, too. Someone in that firm must be exploiting your talent. If you don't question authority and second-guess your superiors, how can you expect to be an effective advocate for your clients?
Paper Doesn't Refuse Ink
PokeMom Sues Burger King Over Poke Balls. Burger King recently recalled 25 million Pokemon Poke Balls in exchange for a free, small order of fries. A Dallas Poke Mom sued Burger King alleging that her 13-month-old daughter died from suffocation because the Poke Ball covered and stuck to the girl's nose and mouth.
Accountability makes the world go 'round, doesn't it? No one likes a dead baby, and when you have no one else to blame but yourself, who better to blame than some one else? But geez, what about this mother? Who lets a child that age play with that kind of a toy? I hope Burger King pokes this mom in the butt.
Without Clients the Law Would Be a Great Profession
Criminal Defendant Slugs His Lawyer In the Face at a Competency Hearing. Picture this: Recently, in San Francisco a criminal defendant in a hearing to determine his competency to stand trial hauled off and punched his own lawyer in the face. No good deed deserves to go unpunished.
Life's Not Fair, But That's Okay.
The Digital Divide: So what?
I can hear Emily Litela, Gilda Radner's old character asking "What's all this fuss I hear about the rich getting richer and wealth being distributed unfairly?" The have-nots in the Silicon Valley are complaining that the wealth is not shared fairly. The Standard, www.thestandard.com, actually ran a rather long piece on this (1/10/00). Valley of the Digital Divide, www.thestandard.com/article/display/0,1151,8678,00.html
"Among the troubling findings: The household income of the poorest 20 percent in Silicon Valley grew by 7.5 percent between 1996 and 1998, to $36,700. By contrast, the top 20 percent of households in the region had an income increase of 28.4 percent, to $136,000. And, while the top fifth's income was up from 1992, the bottom fifth's income actually was down slightly from six years earlier."
What's surprising about this? The Chinese built the railroads. The poor get poorer. That's why the rich get richer. The 80/20 rule prevails. We're set up this way.
Feminists, Whiners and Misogynist Pigs
Recently, I asked my new friend, John, "What kind of women do you like?" I sipped my grande soy mocha and waited for his response.
John is a 43 year-old, Jewish psychiatrist from Winnetka. He has made a modest fortune in the stock market. Well, he's not from Winnetka. He grew up on Lon Gisland. His real name is Jonathan; not "John." He just spells it that way, now. And, he's jealous of his youngest sister and brother-in-law, a filthy-rich Internet e-generation lockjaw from Greenwich. John is balding and twenty pounds overweight. He goes to the health club about once a month, but only if he has a date scheduled. He wears "Dockers" and Porche Design sunglasses. Remember those? His four kids live with him and a nanny. When his ex-wife quit cocaine, she stole John's prescription slips and forged his name to get GHB. (She thought GHB was legal). The pharmacist called the police. The State's Attorney prosecuted her. The female judge gave her probation. John got sole custody of the children, but he still "hemorrhages" money. Rather than sell his stocks he bought her a house in Lake Forest, and pays her maintenance, too. "That's what I get for marrying a cheating Polack. The screwing I got for the screwing I got. But man, what a nympho! She really turned me on. And she never argued with me much."
John wiped his cappuccino foam from his mustache, and then answered my question.
"I like thin girls who don't complain about men." He elaborated. "The women I've been dating. . .you know, the kind I was supposed to marry, all the smart ones with educations and a careers who all became lawyers, doctors, and MBAs; they all whine that we're assholes. And most of them aren't even good looking. They're out of shape. They're divorced, or getting divorced, too. I don't get it. What makes them such a bargain? And why do women think we want to hear them complain about us? Feminists suck."
Perhaps these women wanted to know if John was sensitive, or evolved. Not all educated career women are feminists. "I'm sensitive. I'm a shrink," John said with conviction. "And one thing's for sure: There's no such thing as an uneducated feminist. So, if you don't like feminists, pick a dumb girl."
I asked about other kinds of women, but John rejected that. "Look what happened when I married a girl from nothing." John blew his nose in his napkin, opened it, and then, pretending not to look inside as he lowered his hands from his face, he did look. He raised his eyebrows just a little bit. I reiterated that there are all sorts of women; artists, musicians, or teachers. He looked frustrated when I told him he didn't have to date just lawyers, doctors, and MBA's.
"But those girls don't have money. I want a rich girl. And she has to be sexy, too."
"Well, John, maybe you should date your ex-wife." www.e-commercelawsource.com