What gets me is how little actual practical training comes with legal education or lawyering. Three years of expensive case reading and discussion topped off by a summer of expensive bar training (not included in your law school tuition). You’re then dropped off in a firm or government office where you’re magically expected to know nuts and bolts. You never sit in a chair next to an older lawyer while he drafts a motion and explains what he’s doing, step-by-step, including how to file it with the clerk. The overcrowded legal profession prefers a sink-or-swim approach, since older lawyers don’t have much of an incentive to let anyone else in on the practice pointers. Overall it makes the legal profession a nasty and brutal affair that grinds up the unwary — yet still attracts people in droves.