

Why the World Hates Lawyers - luu
http://www.creditslips.org/creditslips/2014/12/why-the-world-hates-lawyers.html

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cbd1984
More general reasons:

In an adversarial system, unless _both_ sides get a vigorous attorney, the
system doesn't work. In a non-adversarial (or inquisitorial (not that one!))
system, unless the courts give a lot of time to people who are probably guilty
and generally scummy, the system doesn't work.

Unwritten laws are inconsistently applied as a result of gross bias and
favoritism. If you have an unwritten law which is consistently applied, you
have a written law. See below.

Written laws can be gamed. If you have a written law that can't be gamed, you
actually have an unwritten law. See above.

We want it to be fairly difficult for the state to punish people. The kinds of
people who tend to be accused of serious crimes aren't the kinds of people
most of us here would invite out for drinks. Therefore, we see a lot of people
we wouldn't associate with getting the kind of benefit of the doubt we don't
give to waitstaff at a restaurant.

The system working as intended makes for lousy fiction, unless it somehow
involves someone getting off on a technicality. The fact the technicality was
written into the Constitution or is otherwise fundamental to a good, orderly,
and just society gets... elided a bit.

And, of course, there are a lot of assholes in the world, there are a lot of
JDs in the world, there are no real anti-asshole filters on the "earn a JD"
process, so there are a lot of assholes with JDs in the world.

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jaredhansen
This should be called "why the world hates assholes".

Getting a JD doesn't make you more or less of one; it just gives you a
somewhat different toolkit for behaving however it was you wanted to behave
anyway.

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jarsin
The world hates lawyers because they are Takers, not Creators. Plain and
simple.

They use ambiguous, complicated, poorly written laws (basically every civil
law on the books) to bully others and take what is not theirs.

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reverius42
No, their clients do that. Some lawyers may not discourage it, but ultimately
they are bound to do what clients ask of them.

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chrisbennet
Yeah, don't hate the mob enforcer - hate his boss. (sarcasm)

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fatman
I wouldn't expect a business school professor, JD or not, to have any clue
about state consumer protection law.

I would expect an MBA to bluster on in an area in which he was clearly out of
his depth.

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omalleyt
The HBS prof got it "right" in that he pushed for triple damages which is the
highest plausible outcome of this case and has the potential to scare the
defendant. This is the kind of "right" that the HBS prof's consulting clients
(he consults in advertising fraud) want, not the actual kind. This article is
practically an ad for the prof.

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omalleyt
Also, to clarify the prof mentioned specifically that triple damages was a
result of the fact that this was a willful and knowing violation. So in fact
he's actually absolutely right to demand 2-3 times damages. This article is
wrong about him being wrong

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abandonliberty
Can you ever have too many lawyers? They're a self supporting industry that
creates its own work.

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AnimalMuppet
From the point of view of the law profession? Probably not.

From the point of view of demand for their services? Again, probably not, for
the reason you mention (creates its own work).

From the point of view of the overall welfare of society, though? Certainly
you can have too many.

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abandonliberty
Almost every other profession over saturates the market. Lawyers can always
find/create more work.

They can be similar to bankers who provide no value to society but siphon off
money.

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justincormack
Credit Slips is a great blog, highly recommended.

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JeremyMorgan
Then there's guys like this who manage to stain the Harvard grad and lawyer
stereotype in one:

[http://www.boston.com/food-
dining/restaurants/2014/12/09/har...](http://www.boston.com/food-
dining/restaurants/2014/12/09/harvard-business-school-professor-goes-war-over-
worth-chinese-food/KfMaEhab6uUY1COCnTbrXP/story.html)

~~~
ska
That's the precise situation the linked post is about, did you read it before
commenting?

