Can you Make this stuff up?

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Should Law Students Pay Law Firms for Training?

"If associates get all the benefits of training at my law firm in the first three years, and can't really add much value anyway, why don't they pay us?"

That's the question that Dan Hull asks in this provocative post at What About Clients?.

So, here's the strategy that Hull envisions. Rather than pay new hires those stratospheric salaries that have given law firms buyer's remorse, Hull suggests that associates work for minimal salaries in exchange for the benefit of receiving valuable legal training:

A "trainee": (1) would be paid either very minimal or at most starting paralegal-level salaries--don't laugh, paralegals are often remarkably more valuable and cost-efficient than first-year associates--and perhaps some other benefits; or (2) actually pay the law firm a nominal stipend--a "tuition", in effect--in a flexible apprenticeship arrangement which could be revisited eventually. At a minimum, making the associate bear the risk of the investment . . .