导读：在美国，一般法学院毕业生除了本科欠下的债款外，还背负10万美元巨债，他们尽量在能多赚钱的岗位上埋头苦干。
America’s lawyers
美国律师
Guilty as charged
赚钱压力大
Cheaper legal education and more liberal rules would benefit America’s lawyers—and their clients
更低廉的法学教育成本和更自由的政策将使美国律师和他们的客户受益
Feb 2nd 2013 |From the print edition
ALL around the world, lawyers generate more hostility than the members of any other profession—with the possible exception of journalism. But there are few places where clients have more grounds for complaint than America.
从世界范围看，除了记者，律师大概就是最容易惹祸上身的职业了。而美国又是客户对律师抱怨得最凶的地方。
During the decade before the economic crisis, spending on legal services in America grew twice as fast as inflation. The best lawyers made skyscrapers-full of money, tempting ever more students to pile into law schools.
在经济危机前的十年里，美国人的法律服务花费增长速度是通货膨胀速度的两倍。最杰出的律师能赚到堆起来像摩天大楼一样高的钱，这诱使着越来越多的学生争先恐后地涌向法学院。
But most law graduates never get a big-firm job. Many of them instead become the kind of nuisance-lawsuit filer that makes the tort system a costly nightmare.
然而，多数的法学专业毕业生一辈子也进不了知名律所，只能给别人打鸡毛蒜皮的小官司。正是他们使侵权索赔制度变成了价格高昂的噩梦。
According to a study in 2006, America has more lawyers per person of its population than any of 29 countries studied (except Greece), and it spends two to three times as much on its tort system, as a percentage of GDP, as other big economies (except Italy, where things are nearly as bad).
一项2006年的研究显示，美国的律师占总人口之比高于任何其他29个被调查的国家（希腊除外），美国人在侵权诉讼上的花费占国内生产总值的比例是其他大国（情况几乎和美国一样糟糕的意大利除外）的两到三倍。
There are many reasons for this. One is the extortionate costs of a legal education. There is just one path for a lawyer in most American states: a four-year undergraduate degree in some unrelated subject, then a three-year law degree at one of 200 law schools accredited by the American Bar Association and an expensive preparation for the bar exam.
造成这种情况的原因有很多。其中之一就是天价的法学教育成本。在美国的大多数州，要成为律师只有一条路可走：先在某不相关的专业读四年本科，然后在经过美国律师协会认证的200所法学院中选择一所修读三年的法学学位，再花费一笔巨资为参加司法考试做准备。
This leaves today’s average law-school graduate with $100,000 of debt on top of undergraduate debts. Law-school debt means that many cannot afford to go into government or non-profit work, and that they have to work fearsomely hard.
这使得今天一般的法学院毕业生除了本科欠下的债款外，还要背负10万美元的巨债。由于还债的压力，很多毕业生都不会选择政府或公益性单位，只能在尽量能多赚钱的岗位上埋头苦干。
Reforming the system would help both lawyers and their customers—and these, at some point in a life, include most people. Sensible ideas have been around for a long time, but the state-level bodies that govern the profession have been too conservative to implement them.
制度改革将不仅成为律师们的福音，也能使他们的客户受惠——大多数人在一生中都会有一两次需要和律师打交道的时候。关于改革，早已有人提出了合理的建议，但是，管辖律师业的州级机关太过保守，不愿照此执行。
One idea is to allow people to study law as an undergraduate degree, as they can in common-law countries such as Canada and Britain. Another is to let students sit for the bar after only two years of law school (see article); the third year of law school is too often filled with elective courses like “Nietzsche and the Law” (on offer at New York University) that make little sense for working attorneys.
其中一个建议是，允许学生在本科阶段就修读法律；这在加拿大和英国这样的英美法系国家已经成为现实。另外一个建议是，让学生们在法学院学习两年后即参加司法考试（见另文），因为第三年往往尽是像“尼采和法”（纽约大学开有此课）这样的选修课，对律师实践并没有多少实质性的帮助。
If the bar exam is truly a stern enough test for a would-be lawyer, those who can sit it earlier should be allowed to do so. Students who do not need the extra training could cut their debt mountain by a third. Those who stay should use the time to acquire practical expertise or develop a speciality.
如果司法考试确实能够有效检验准律师们的能力，那么那些已经准备就绪的就应该被允许提前参加考试。这些不需要第三年额外训练的学生便能将自己的巨债之山削减三分之一。而对于那些坚持到第三年再参加考试的学生来说，他们应该将第三年的时间用于学习一些实用技能或发展一项专长。
Twelve angry customers
十二怒客
The other reason why costs are so high is the restrictive guild-like ownership structure of the business. Except in the District of Columbia, non-lawyers may not own any share of a law firm. This keeps fees high and innovation slow.
律师业成本如此之高的另一个原因是其行会式的限制性所有权结构。除了在哥伦比亚特区，非律师身份的人不能拥有律师事务所的任何股份。这使得律师费居高不下，创新机制发展缓慢。
At the top, lawyers’ fees have risen beyond $1,000 per hour. At the low end, companies such as LegalZoom, an automated online service providing wills, leases and simple contracts, is forced to limit its offering to customers lest it be prosecuted for practising law without a licence.
在金字塔的顶端，高级律师的费用已经超出1000美元每小时；而在与其相对的底端，像LegalZoom这种自动在线提供遗嘱、租约和简单合同撰写的公司不得不限制其给客户提供的服务，除非他们想被起诉无照经营。
There is pressure for change from within the profession—one law firm, Jacoby & Meyers, is suing three states for the right to take in outside investments (see article)—but opponents of change among the regulators insist that keeping outsiders out of a law firm isolates lawyers from the pressure to make money rather than serve clients ethically.
在律师行业内部也有要求改革的呼声。Jacoby&Meyers律所正在起诉三个州政府，争取接受外来投资的权利（见另文）。但管理层中的反对者们坚持认为，拒绝外来投资能够防止律师为了金钱而忘记职业道德。
Far from undermining clients’ interests, allowing non-lawyers to own equity in law firms would reduce costs and improve services to customers by encouraging law firms, many of which are still knee-deep in paper, to use technology and to employ professional managers—the kind of people who tend to expect stock options as part of their package—to focus on improving firms’ efficiency. Anyone who thinks American lawyers do not already face pressure to make money could use the services of a different kind of professional.
