The Relationship Between Educational Institutions and Legal Careers

This chapter examines the relationship between educational institutions and legal careers in Japan. We divided the survey data into two groups: respondents in the first through 59th and 60th–69th legal apprenticeship cohorts, which roughly correspond, respectively, to before and after the establishment of Japan’s modern law school system. Categories analyzed by university and law school include locations, initial annual income, the number of lawyers, and fields of specialization, at first law firmLaw firmfirst jobs. The results showed various changes from the first through 59th cohorts to the 60th–69th cohorts. For example, regarding the number of lawyers at law firms where graduates had their first jobs, academic inequalities, among schools and within given schools alike, grew more among the 60th–69th cohorts than the first through 59th cohorts, with the widening inequalities among schools in this regard in recent years clarified by further subdividing the 60th–69th cohorts into the 60th–65th and the 66th–69th cohorts.