Estate Planning

Ouch! It hurts...

By Hull & Hull LLP

...but every recession has lucky people too.  To save you hours of watching cable news and reading, here's a snapshot of good news and bad news on the legal profession in Canada and around the Common Law world:

• IN THE CROSS-HAIRS: with companies trying to pare their legal budgets between 6% and 35%, the #1 target for general counsels is... 
• THANKS BERNIE: a freakish confluence of circumstances, including the Madoff scandal, is allowing top rates for UK regulatory lawyers to hit a stunning USD1,440/hour.  That's professional athlete territory, only now it's being paid to people with minds. 
• FAMINE IN IRELAND: hundreds of unemployed solicitors.  Bleak prospects.  All that remains is for the potato harvest to fail.
• TRANSACTIONS: law firm mergers up 33% in the US.  This, though, is an indication of nothing definite.  Mergers ideally result in "efficiencies of scale", with a real-world meaning of fewer bodies doing the same work (we each had 2 doing the work of 1.5.  Now we can have 3 doing the work of 3) or "economies of scope" (you do this, we do that, let's merge and cross-refer).
• RED SKY AT NIGHT OR IN THE MORNING?: major US law firm posts record revenue of $668 million for the fiscal year ended March 31, 2009, up 2.2%.
• SALARY FREEZES: by a major US law firm.
• PAY CUTS NOT TERMINATIONS: a major US law firm institutes $17,500 pay cuts, others may follow.   Required measure for the entire US economy?
• THE COLD EQUATIONS: the problem simplified. (apologies to Tom Godwin)
• THEN COME THE TERMINATIONS
• "DEFERRED EMPLOYMENT" IS NOT DEFEAT: a peptalk to grads facing an economic wasteland. 
• BOOM TIMES 
• LAW FIRMS FIRING: especially US firms, unsurprisingly.
• BUT LAW FIRMS HIRING: in Canada, apparently mostly in bankruptcy and litigation.
• AND BLACKBERRY DEFIES RECESSION: attaboy!  Any good news is very good news.

Times are always interesting. 

Have a great week,

Chris Graham

Full post as published by Toronto Estate Law Blog on April 13, 2009 (boomark / email).