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Government Contracts
When a business sells something to a government agency, there are special laws and regulations that apply. Government contracts lawyers are there to help clients with any questions when navigating these rules to have the government as a customer. Businesses looking for a contract with the government should visit the U.S. Small Business Administration site.
A government contracts lawyer gets to help with every step of the process, from submitting a “bid,” to negotiating the agreement, to litigating any disputes that arise. Familiarity with contract law is crucial. There are job opportunities with law firms (who represent the businesses) or with the government. Large companies that specialize in products that are sold to the government may hire in-house counsel. While a specific background is not necessary, having worked for the government in the past may give you a step up in entering this career field.
In addition to taking any available classes in government contracts law, you should apply for an internship with U.S. Small Business Administration or an externship or summer associate legal honor’s program with the U.S. Government Accountability Office.
The American Bar Association offers a Section of Public Contract Law. For more information about government contract law, you may also want to check out the Library of Congress’s resources.
One final important note: since you are either working for or negotiating with the government, the majority of jobs are in the D.C. area. You may find it harder to work somewhere else in the country, or you may have to travel more.
Government Relations
Government relations lawyers focus on advocacy. They represent a company, organization, or group that has certain interests, and their job is to make sure these interests are known in the government. This may mean appearing before Congress, seeking a policy change from a government agency, making sure a law or regulation includes something or conversely stopping a piece of legislation that hurts the client.
Government relation law jobs vary a lot depending on the client represented. The most important skill is understanding the legislative process involving Congress and the regulatory process with executive branch agencies. Fortune 500 companies need government relations lawyers to represent their interests. Most government relations lawyers work for huge, well-known law firms. If you want to enter this area of law, a major in politics and a job working for the government are a good background to have.
Health Law
The health care industry is incredibly broad; it includes hospitals, insurers, the people who create medical devices, and the people who actually treat patients, to name a few. There is a lot of risk involved in the health industry; correspondingly, there is a lot of regulation. This requires health lawyers to have a vast knowledge of constantly changing health laws.
Some of the important federal laws that affect the health industry are:
- Social Security Amendments of 1965
- Health Insurance Portability and Accountability Act (HIPAA)
- Consolidated Omnibus Budget Reconciliation Act (COBRA)
- Patient Protection and Affordable Care Act
- Emergency Medical Treatment and Active Labor Act (EMTALA)
The sub-areas of health care law are too expansive to fully explain. However, if you are thinking about becoming a health lawyer you should first and foremost read all of the above laws. If these put you to sleep, this is probably not the area of law for you.
Health care is a hot topic in politics today; if the thought of dealing with all of the new changes and rules makes you cringe, consider another area.
Education and Background:
Most people who work in health law have a passion for the health field. This may mean coming from some sort of medical or risk management background. Or, you may just have a passion for dealing with complex and constantly evolving issues.
The American Bar Association has a Health Law Section to join.
Health care is gaining such media coverage that you can expect educational opportunities focusing on this area to increase.
Getting a job:
Where you get a job depends in large part on what area of health law you want to focus on. For example, you may ensure the compliance of healthcare providers. Or, you might help a client with a dispute over a health insurance contract. If you work for a government agency, you might be investigating fraud, whereas if you work for a medical manufacturing company, you are trying to protect a company.
According to Georgetown Law, the places you can get a job in the area of law include:
- Law firms with departments specializing in health care law
- Government agencies
- Hospitals
- Pharmaceutical companies
- Insurance companies
- Medical equipment corporations
- Other organizations with a focus on health care
(Health Law)
Average salary:
Health lawyers are quite well paid. Medical attorneys and health care lawyers earn just over $150,000 on average, though it varies a lot by employer (Lawyer Salary – Top 10 Law Careers).
Would you like this practice area?
You need to have a constant desire to learn and a willingness to keep up with complex and ever-changing laws. The health care industry is wide-ranging, so you will have quite the variety of options available to you depending on your preferences. You must be very detail-oriented because this area of law is highly regulated.
Consider whether these articles interest you:
Vaccination over Parental Objection — Should Adolescents Be Allowed to Consent to Receiving Vaccines? (Omer, Opel, and Silverman)
“The United States has been experiencing an increasing number of measles outbreaks, and more measles cases were reported in the first 5 months of 2019 than in any full year since 1992, which was 8 years before endemic transmission was interrupted. Parents’ resistance to vaccination is leaving more children vulnerable to measles and various other preventable illnesses. Some of these children have begun to seek opportunities to revisit vaccine-refusal decisions made on their behalf by their parents and are now pursuing vaccination.” Read more
CMS Announces Pilot Program for Clinicians to View Claims Data of Medicare Beneficiaries (The National Law Review)
“On July 30, 2019, the Centers for Medicare & Medicaid Services (CMS) announced “Data at the Point of Care” (DPC), a pilot program that will provide clinicians with access to claims data. The pilot program follows on the heels of the recently proposed Interoperability and Patient Access Proposed Rule, which would require regulated health plans to make patient data available through an application programming interface (API). These actions are also part of the MyHealthEData initiative spearheaded by the White House Office of American Innovation.” Read more
Neil Armstrong’s family received $6M in secret settlement with hospital that treated him before death (Weiss)
“Astronaut Neil Armstrong’s relatives obtained a confidential $6 million settlement for alleged medical errors by the Ohio hospital that performed heart bypass surgery on him before his death in August 2012, according to published reports. The New York Times and the Cincinnati Enquirer reported on the secret settlement days after the 50th anniversary of Armstrong’s walk on the moon. The newspapers learned of the wrongful death case from an anonymous person who sent unsolicited documents.” Read more
Conclusion:
If you are looking for a fast-paced and constantly changing area of law, and you enjoy looking at the little details, this may be a good area of law for you.
Immigration Law
If there’s one area of law that has been getting a lot of publicity lately, it’s immigration law. With laws that seemingly change every day, lawyers are up for a challenge if they want to work in this inspiring but often heartbreaking area of law.
Who can come into the country? How long can they stay? How can someone become a US citizen? Congress has the exclusive right to legislate immigration law, a right granted to it by the US Constitution. Thus, the rules on how immigrants can become citizens are constantly changing as Congress changes, and a continuing legal education becomes more important for immigration lawyers than for lawyers in perhaps any other area. This is not an area that would be good to practice as a general practitioner, therefore, because it requires specialized knowledge that must be up to date.
Of course, one of the benefits that comes with practicing immigration law is learning about other countries and cultures. Hotly contested political issues aside, an immigration lawyer has to deal with the many complications that arise when completing a vast amount of forms. The process may seem extremely intimidating to someone who is not familiar with the US process, and thus immigrants are truly at the mercy of the system and dependent on their immigration lawyer to guide them through any problems that may come up.
Some immigration lawyers may supplement their careers with other similar activities they find enjoyable, such as volunteering in the community or helping with human rights movements.
Education and Background:
Communication-intensive backgrounds may be useful to this practice area. Knowing many languages, being familiar with a lot of cultures, or having political experience may also be pluses. Most importantly, being involved in public service in some way provides a smooth transition into this area of law. Volunteer activities that correlate well with immigration law are worth pursuing. If you are in law school, consider joining extracurricular activities related to this area of law.
Of course, as with any practice area, take relevant courses if your law school offers them and do your best to secure an internship in that field of law to test it out and see if you like it.
Backgrounds serving people in difficult circumstances will be of great assistance, as you will likely come across some heart-wrenching and traumatic stories in immigration law and may need to assist with domestic violence and abuse situations.
Finally, you may want to connect with other people in immigration law. The American Immigration Lawyers Association offers a lot of useful resources and events as well as a network of people with similar interests.
Getting a job:
- Large law firms might include immigration law as one area of practice
- Small or boutique law firms may specialize in immigration law
- There are government agencies that employ immigration lawyers
- There are nonprofit organizations that employ immigration lawyers
- You will earn a higher salary working for the federal government than for a state or local government
- You can practice anywhere in the country – it doesn’t have to be at the border or on the coast
- With a changing political climate, immigration lawyers are in high demand
Average salary:
The median salary is $120,000 according to the US Department of Labor, but it is significantly higher for those employed by the federal government than for those employed by state or local governments (NESL). As expected, working for a small nonprofit will also yield a smaller salary than working for a large firm or company (NESL).
Would you like this practice area?
Strengths/Weaknesses: Strong interpersonal relationship-building and communication skills are required for this area of law. Compassion, kindness, and a genuine desire to help are characteristics that often shine through in lawyers who practice this area of law. If “dealing with people” is not your strong suit, you may not enjoy immigration law.
Likes/Dislikes: You must enjoy collaboration and working with others because you will spend a great deal of time working directly with the client to solve problems. If you do not enjoy high-stress, emotional situations and helping people in unfortunate circumstances, this is not the area for you. If you have a love for learning and want to work in a constantly changing area of law that requires constant re-education, however, you may enjoy immigration law.
Consider whether these articles interest you:
Strangers in a strange land: ‘Metering’ makes asylum rights meaningless, immigrant advocates say (Laird)
“Metering is the U.S. government’s practice of limiting the number of people who can seek asylum at the border each day—even though the Immigration and Nationality Act says any foreign national “who arrives in the United States” may apply for asylum. In metering, CBP officers simply prevent asylum-seekers from arriving in the United States in the first place, by turning them away when they try to enter legally. Instead, they’re told to put their names on a waiting list and wait weeks in Mexico for their names to be called.” Read more
New rule would make applying for US asylum impossible for most immigrants at the southern border (Weiss)
“Most immigrants at the Southern border won’t be eligible to apply for asylum under an interim final rule published Monday by the Trump administration. Under the new rule, immigrants at the Southern border must apply for asylum in at least one country they enter while on their way to the United States…. The rule effectively ends asylum for any migrant at the Southern border who isn’t from Mexico, according to the Los Angeles Times. The proposal would require migrants to apply for asylum even though the United States hasn’t negotiated a “safe third-country” agreement with the countries they traverse.” Read more
ACLU sues state police, alleging they’re acting as immigration authorities (Couloumbis)
“Pennsylvania State Police troopers have routinely violated the law by stopping and holding people based solely on their Latino appearance, terrifying drivers and passengers while usurping federal authority to investigate supposed immigration violations, the ACLU claims in a federal lawsuit filed recently. The troopers’ conduct, the suit says, has sent a clear message to communities across Pennsylvania: The state police are in the immigration-enforcement business.” Read more
Attorney Spotlight:
Emily Amara Gordon works for Amara Law, a firm specializing in Green Cards & Residency, Deportation & Removal Hearings, and Immigration Bond & Criminal Offenses.
Emily’s interview:
Q: How long have you been a lawyer?
A: 5 years
Q: Where did you go to law school?
A: New England Law
Q: In what practice area(s) do you practice? If more than one, what’s the percentage of each?
A: Immigration and Criminal Defense (50/50)
Q: What size is your firm?
A: 2 lawyers and some support staff
Q: Describe an average day at work…
A: Every day is different. However, I most often meet with clients, send emails, go to court, and have USCIS interviews. I don’t spend too much time on the phone (maybe 2 hours a day max); most of my communication is through other methods of messaging. I write some motions and occasionally a memo. For immigration, I spend a lot of time preparing filings.
Q: How many hours a week do you typically work?
A: It varies depending on whether I am on trial that week, but I would say I average 60. Since it is my practice, the advantage is I can control my schedule to some degree, and I enjoy that flexibility.
Q: What makes your day-to-day work different from that in other practice areas?
A: It’s hard because I’ve never done anything else, but I would say that I’m in the courtroom a lot and not behind my desk very much. On immigration, it’s a lot of collaboration with clients. There is no opposing counsel and you have to work well with the clients. With immigration, the law changes a lot (as most people know from the news) so you really need to be tuned in to current events. My practice area is very hands-on!
Q: What do you like most about your job/practice area?
A: I like being able to know that I have hopefully helped families have a life in the United States and have a future because they are excellent contributions to the country.
Q: What do you like least about your job/practice area?
A: I don’t like seeing the pain and suffering that clients are going through under the current administration, and the law doesn’t always provide a way to help people, which can be heartbreaking.
Q: You would be a happy and successful immigration lawyer if you…
A: …have a lifetime desire to learn, because it is one of the most challenging areas of law and is constantly changing. You can never learn enough!
Q: What advice would you give students interested in learning more?
A: Talk to as many lawyers as you can and get as many opinions as you can, so that you can make an informed decision. For criminal or immigration law, go to court and watch a case! Volunteer at citizenship clinics, help with communities in need, and see what it is really like to help people.
You want to make money and do well, but you also want to enjoy what you do – that’s always the goal!
– Emily Amara Gordon
Conclusion:
What you do outside of the classroom will impact your career in immigration law to a great extent. If you are a student, start joining extracurriculars and doing volunteer work in relevant areas.
Insurance Law
The three sub-areas within insurance law are insurance coverage, insurance defense litigation, and insurance compliance.
- Insurance coverage typically involves an insured person trying to recover through their insurance policy where the issue is whether the policy actually covers the loss or liability. Thus, this area of insurance law requires a focus on understanding and analyzing the minute details of a policy.
- Insurance defense involves a third party suing someone covered by insurance. The insurer supplies the lawyer to defend the person covered by insurance against the action of the third party. This area of law is focused on the unique facts of a case and although it involves litigation, newer attorneys may be primarily assigned document drafting. Insurance companies often have legal counsel, but for insurance defense the cases are sometimes sent to outside counsel.
- Insurance compliance involves making sure insurance companies are complying with industry regulations. Insurance companies hire in-house counsel to make sure they are compliant, and outside counsel helps with investigations when needed.
There are many different types of insurance including homeowner’s insurance, auto insurance, and life insurance, to name a few. The insurance industry is huge, with net premiums written totaling $1.2 trillion in 2017 (Insurance Information Institute). The federal government is not very involved in most areas of insurance; most states have an insurance administrator’s office that focuses on creating rules and regulations for insurance companies.
Education and Background:
Many law schools offer classes in insurance law. After taking these, try to get an internship with an insurance law firm or work for an insurance company in some capacity. Even if you can’t find a legal internship with an insurance company, working for them in some other way will still expose you to the intricacies of the industry. Try to job shadow an insurance lawyer to see what he or she does day-to-day.
The University of Connecticut School of Law offers an LL.M. in Insurance Law. If you are sure this is the area of law you want to practice, getting an LL.M. might be a good way to jumpstart your career.
Getting a job:
Because insurance is a trillion-dollar industry and there are many different jobs available within insurance law, this is a stable and “safe” area of law to practice. In 2017, there were 5,954 insurance companies in the U.S. and there were 2.7 million people employed in the industry (Insurance Information Institute).
Where you work depends on which sub-area of insurance law you specialize in. If you work in compliance, for example, most opportunities are available in-house, though it is possible that companies contract with a law firm. If you work in defense, there are opportunities both in-house and with mid-to-large size law firms. Harrison Barnes, founder of BCG Attorney Search, says that it is more difficult to move upward in defense, whereas coverage attorneys have highly marketable skills and will be able to find spots in top law firms easily. To read more about the marketability of these areas, see his article.
Salary and comparison of the sub-areas:
The salary is rather modest for most lawyers in this practice area. If you are looking for a more intense, “fun”, and fast-paced option, you would enjoy insurance defense; this area often doesn’t pay much, however. Compliance lawyers also don’t make much, but the benefit is having a stable career with an insurance company. Insurance coverage attorneys must be extremely detail-oriented and strong writers; they are the ones who tend to be better paid within insurance law. They often handle extremely complex issues and write long reports.
Consider whether these articles interest you:
Dirty Secrets of Insurance Defense: Five facts outside counsel hopes you won’t consider (Larimore)
“After 15 years as a lawyer in private practice, I thought I had a pretty good idea about how the insurance defense business worked. That is, until I took an in-house counsel position for an insurance company. I realized then that I had no idea how little I actually understood. From my new perspective, I found things that seemed obvious to me as defense counsel were nearly invisible from the viewpoint of the insurer. I also came to learn that, as outside counsel, I had very little understanding of the business processes that drove decisions for my clients.” Read more
Compliance Issues That Your Insurance Company Should Know (Salomon)
“Navigating regulatory matters in the insurance industry has never involved more challenges than it does today. If you feel like you and your IT team face more scrutiny in compliance issues, it isn’t your imagination. Corporate Compliance Insights reported that, as far back as 2011, “Regulatory scrutiny of the insurance industry has never been more acute. Government regulators from a host of disparate disciplines are intensely focused on making sure we have the controls in place to avoid another financial meltdown.”” Read more
Contract and Claim in Insurance Law (Feinman)
“Every insurance policy is a contract between the policyholder and the insurer. Fundamentally, however, almost every insurance law problem, dispute, or doctrine is really about paying or not paying claims. These two features—contract and claim—are at the heart of most insurance law disputes. The significance of insurance as contract is generally recognized, but the centrality of claims, less so.” Read more
Conclusion:
Insurance law is a huge part of the American economy, and insurance lawyers play an important role in keeping the system running smoothly.
Intellectual
Property Law
Artists should be able to benefit from the creative work they contribute to society. This only works if other people can’t copy artistic ideas. Intellectual property is what gives artists, writers, and inventors the legal rights to their creations. Intellectual property law encompasses scientific and creative works. Obtaining legal rights to the work and the ability to enforce these rights vary with the type of work. Intellectual property includes trademarks, patents, copyright, and trade secrets.
Many people do not know what IP law entails and the huge variety of work that exists within IP law. Until you have taken a basic class in IP Law as well as more specialized classes in Copyright Law, Patent Law, and Trademark Law, you do not have enough information to decide if IP law is for you. You need to know what area of IP law you want to focus on. The demand for sub-areas of IP law is strikingly different; read this article for more information.
Education and Background:
The demand for patent lawyers is extremely high. However, if you want to become a patent lawyer, you need to have a specialized scientific or technical background. In addition to passing a state bar exam, you need to pass the United States Patent and Trademark Office’s Patent Bar Exam. To even sit for this exam, you must have a Bachelor’s degree in a science or engineering field. In recent years, less than half of those who sit for the exam have passed. So, while demand for patent lawyers will likely continue to go up, if you do not already have a science or engineering degree, you should not even consider patent law.
On the other hand, it is not difficult to become a trademark or copyright lawyer. Many corporate lawyers dabble in trademark work and are “generalists”. Even patent attorneys will handle other areas within IP law if they have the time. Because so many people are capable of handling this less specialized area of law, it is harder to find a job. Having a background in business, marketing, writing, or a creative major may be helpful for the other sub-areas of IP law, but it is not essential.
Getting a job:
The American Bar Association has a Section of Intellectual Property Law to join. You can also join the American Intellectual Property Law Association (AIPLA).
AIPLA has lawyers in it that work for law firms, corporations, in government service, and in the academic community. They have a career center that allows you to search for intellectual property jobs. You can limit it by the type of practice: All, Private, Corporate, Government, Non-profit, and other. You can also limit it by the practice area (trademark, copyright, patent, etc.), by the industry (biotech, chemical, computers, etc.), and by state. This is a great resource for those interested in exploring what opportunities exist in IP law.
A quick look on this career center does confirm that patent law is the main area of law with job opportunities available. If you have a background in science, it is highly recommended that you go into patent law because it is in very high demand.
Average salary:
IP law is one of the most profitable areas of law. On average, IP lawyers make $131,728 (Lawyer Salary – Top Ten Law Careers).
Would you like this practice area?
Intellectual property law is particularly well suited to those who are curious. If you are inquisitive and creative, you will enjoy seeing new developments and investigating what makes a creative work unique. Regardless of the industry, you must be enthusiastic about how your client’s creation is made and marketed. Having a good understanding of how the industry operates and what competitors there are may also help you understand what sets your client’s creation apart. IP law often overlaps with international law and entertainment law, so see if those areas interest you.
Consider whether these articles interest you:
Adidas loses three-stripe trademark battle in European court (Jolly)
“Adidas has been unsuccessful in an attempt to expand its trademark three-stripe design in the EU after a court ruled it was not “distinctive” enough. The company did not “prove that that mark has acquired, throughout the territory of the EU, distinctive character following the use which had been made of it”, the general court of the EU said on Wednesday.” Read more
“Call it a battle of the beauty brands. On Wednesday, the American arm of French giant L’Oreal slapped its much smaller (but rapidly growing) rival, Houston, Texas-based Drunk Elephant with an ugly new lawsuit, alleging that the cult-followed 5-year old brand is infringing one of its patents in connection with an award-winning and highly-buzzed-about $80-per-ounce Vitamin C serum.” Read more
Lady Gaga Sued For ‘Shallow’; Copyright Lawsuit Trend Continues
“Lady Gaga’s song “Shallow” earned the Grammy-winning singer-songwriter her first Academy Award. The song, featured in the 2018 film A Star Is Born, is now the subject of a multi-million-dollar lawsuit. Steve Ronsen, an until-now-unknown songwriter claims Gaga stole a three-note progression from his 2012 song “Almost.”” Read more
Conclusion:
Here is an interesting fact about IP law: January 1st is Public Domain Day – the day when copyrights from 95 years ago expire, and creative works enter the public domain. The copyright term used to be 75 years, so because of the 20-year copyright extension, there was no Public Domain Day for 20 years until January 1st, 2019. That was a day to celebrate! Many famous 1923 works entered the public domain; for more information, check out this page.