Lawline.com

Should recent law graduates have to pay law firms for the experience they receive?

John Hull, operator of the blog, "What About Paris?", is proposing that recent law graduates pay law firms for the experience they receive.  This is quite frightening.  He feels that the experience a new law graduate receives from a law firm, the first three years following graduation, is more valuable to the graduate than the work they provide to the firm.  He proposes that instead of getting paid with money from firms when graduating law school, one will be paid by experience.  Moreover, the graduate may have to pay the law firm for the "education" they are receiving from the firm.

At first glance for any prospective law student, or current law
student, this idea seems ludicrous.   However, it is a notion that the
United Kingdom has been practicing for a hundred and fifty years.
Additionally, this is similar to the education structure we have in the United States for doctors. Some argue that if this concept was implemented, only those with a strong passion for law would seek to go to law school.  Others argue that it could have the opposite effect, and prevent bright intellectual minds from choosing a legal career.

After all, law students come out of law school with tens of thousands, possibly even hundreds of thousands, of dollars in debt.  For people who cannot afford this, it may be a major turnoff to joining the practice of law.