Private Law School Tuition Projections for 2016, 2021

If you weren’t looking, you missed it: I finished redoing the law school tuition page on October 3. I meant to finish the private law school tuition projections first, but sometimes it’s just easier to mindlessly key in 2,217 tuition figures than to redo a table.

So, how does one project law school tuition? I just extended the linear regression of each law school’s tuition based on its Official Guide entries going back to 2004. The basis is that past tuition increases are a predictor of future ones. The alternatives are making exponential projections based on previous tuition, using the average annualized growth rate for the last several years (5.32 percent), and arbitrarily knocking two percentage points off the average annualized growth rate (3.32 percent). None of these is particularly satisfactory, but when I tested methodologies recently by using the 2004-2010 tuition figures to predict law schools’ 2011 tuition, which we already have, I found that linear regression was the least precise in absolute terms but it was also the most likely to low-ball a law school’s actual 2011 tuition. I think this relative inaccuracy is important because no one seriously expects tuition to grow as quickly as it did even a few years ago.

As with last time, I’m excluding the two Puerto Rico private law schools and Brigham Young’s LDS tuition. The handful of public law schools that are clearly not taking any state subsidies is listed separately. The criteria for joining this ignominious class of public schools is having an in-state tuition that’s higher than the average private law school that’s outside of Puerto Rico. It’s possible that some public schools aren’t being subsidized but are still cheaper than the average private law school, e.g. Penn State, which charges resident and non-resident students the same. Lucky them.

The only addition for this year is that I’m adding a column on the right side giving the “relative variance,” which is a measure of how (in)accurate the linear regression test was when comparing projected tuition to their 2011 outcomes. I think the lower the better, but anything below -3.0 percent or so is probably too low. The idea is to give readers a measure of how reliable the estimate is, given that some law school engaged in serious expansions in recent years that I hope they couldn’t get away with now, especially Faulkner University, which doubled its tuition in the span of a few years.

These are ranked according to their 2021-22 projected tuition, enjoy:

# SCHOOL TUITION: 2011-2012 TUITION: 2016-2017 TUITION: 2021-2022 RELATIVE VARIANCE
1. Cornell Law School 53,226 66,800 79,800 1.7%
2. Yale Law School 52,525 64,600 76,300 1.1%
3. Columbia University 52,902 63,800 75,000 -0.9%
4. Northwestern University 51,920 63,400 74,800 0.4%
5. University of Pennsylvania 50,718 62,200 73,500 0.4%
6. New England School of Law 40,984 57,300 72,300 5.1%
7. Seton Hall University 46,840 59,900 72,200 2.8%
8. Cardozo 48,370 60,600 72,200 2.3%
9. Vermont Law School 43,993 58,400 72,000 3.2%
10. Duke University 49,617 60,500 71,400 0.2%
11. University of Southern California 50,591 61,000 71,300 0.0%
12. Brooklyn Law School 48,441 60,000 71,200 1.0%
13. Fordham University 47,986 59,600 70,700 2.1%
14. St. John’s University 46,450 58,700 70,700 1.3%
15. Baylor University 43,573 57,000 70,200 0.7%
16. Stanford Law School 49,179 59,400 70,100 -1.6%
17. Syracuse University 45,647 59,000 70,100 8.8%
18. New York University 50,336 59,900 69,700 -0.6%
19. Harvard Law School 48,786 59,100 69,400 0.2%
20. Vanderbilt University 46,148 58,200 68,900 5.2%
21. Touro College 41,890 55,600 67,900 5.7%
22. Faulkner University 32,187 51,300 67,800 17.1%
23. University of Chicago 47,786 58,000 67,800 1.5%
24. Georgetown 46,865 57,400 67,500 1.7%
25. Quinnipiac University 45,050 55,700 66,500 -0.4%
26. Hofstra University 45,600 56,000 66,400 0.4%
27. Washington and Lee University 41,947 54,200 65,900 2.6%
28. American University 45,096 55,500 65,700 0.9%
29. George Washington University 45,750 55,300 64,800 0.2%
30. Washington University 46,042 55,200 64,500 -0.2%
31. New York Law School 47,800 56,000 63,900 1.0%
32. Loyola Marymount 43,060 53,800 63,700 3.0%
33. Tulane University 43,684 53,800 63,400 1.6%
34. California Western 42,700 52,500 62,500 -0.5%
35. DePaul University 41,690 52,100 62,500 -0.2%
36. Illinois Institute of Technology 42,030 52,200 62,500 0.2%
37. Emory University 45,098 53,600 62,100 -0.2%
38. Pepperdine University 42,840 52,400 61,900 0.9%
39. Case Western Reserve University 42,564 52,200 61,700 0.0%
40. Roger Williams University 39,550 50,900 61,700 2.3%
41. Suffolk University 42,660 52,300 61,600 1.9%
42. Seattle University 39,282 50,500 61,600 1.0%
43. Chapman University 41,873 51,800 61,400 1.0%
44. Notre Dame 43,335 52,100 61,200 -1.2%
45. University of New Hampshire 39,990 50,400 61,000 -0.5%
46. Phoenix School of Law 37,764 49,600 60,900 2.9%
47. Thomas Jefferson 41,000 50,600 60,600 -2.2%
48. University of La Verne 40,732 50,500 60,500 -1.2%
49. Golden Gate University 40,515 50,500 60,400 0.5%
50. Southwestern University 42,200 50,700 60,100 -3.8%
51. Charlotte 36,916 48,500 59,800 2.2%
52. University of the Pacific 41,393 50,600 59,400 1.4%
53. University of San Diego 42,574 51,300 59,300 2.8%
54. Southern Methodist University 42,057 50,400 59,200 -1.9%
55. Northeastern University 42,296 50,900 59,000 2.1%
56. Catholic University of America 41,995 50,200 58,800 -1.4%
57. University of Denver 38,502 49,000 58,500 4.2%
58. Union University 41,845 50,500 58,500 2.9%
59. Boston University 42,654 50,400 58,100 0.2%
60. Wake Forest University 38,756 48,600 57,900 2.3%
61. Valparaiso University 38,086 48,100 57,600 2.4%
62. Boston College 41,818 49,900 57,400 2.4%
63. University of San Francisco 40,544 48,800 57,100 0.2%
64. Santa Clara University 41,790 49,000 56,700 -1.9%
65. Whittier Law School 39,140 48,000 56,500 1.3%
66. John Marshall (Chicago) 38,180 47,400 56,200 1.8%
67. Florida Coastal 36,968 46,300 56,000 -1.4%
68. Marquette University 37,570 46,300 55,600 -2.1%
69. Western State University 37,284 46,200 55,500 -1.6%
70. Loyola University Chicago 39,496 47,600 55,500 1.0%
71. Villanova University 37,780 46,800 55,400 1.9%
72. University of Miami 39,848 47,700 55,100 2.0%
73. University of St. Thomas 34,898 45,900 54,800 10.0%
74. Western New England College 38,240 46,600 54,700 1.6%
75. Pace University 40,978 48,200 54,700 2.7%
76. Charleston Law School 36,774 45,500 53,600 3.0%
77. Michigan State University 35,840 44,900 53,500 2.5%
78. Mercer University 36,860 45,500 53,400 3.0%
79. Loyola University New Orleans 38,266 45,500 53,400 -3.4%
80. John Marshall (Atlanta) 34,810 44,000 53,100 1.1%
81. Elon University 34,550 43,800 53,000 -0.6%
82. Lewis & Clark College 36,412 44,000 52,100 -2.2%
83. Oklahoma City University 35,470 43,500 51,600 0.0%
84. William Mitchell 35,710 43,400 51,400 -0.8%
85. Campbell University 33,910 42,700 51,400 0.6%
86. University of Detroit 36,050 43,400 51,300 -3.0%
87. Samford University 34,848 43,000 51,200 -0.3%
88. Drexel University 36,051 43,600 51,200 -0.6%
89. Ave Maria 36,448 44,300 51,100 5.2%
90. Drake University 34,006 42,400 50,600 1.2%
91. Hamline 34,555 42,800 50,600 1.7%
92. Saint Louis University 36,175 43,400 49,900 2.8%
93. Widener University 36,450 43,000 49,800 -0.8%
94. Widener University (Harrisburg) 36,450 43,000 49,800 -0.8%
95. Duquesne University 33,752 41,800 49,700 0.3%
96. University of Richmond 35,430 42,500 49,500 0.3%
97. Stetson University 35,466 42,200 49,400 -2.5%
98. St. Thomas University 34,618 41,800 49,100 -0.9%
99. Cooley 34,340 40,900 49,100 -8.2%
100. Barry University 33,630 41,200 48,200 3.0%
101. Creighton University 32,494 40,500 48,200 1.5%
102. Capital University 32,683 40,900 48,200 4.9%
103. Nova Southeastern University 33,250 40,800 47,500 3.9%
104. Gonzaga University 34,105 40,700 47,200 0.3%
105. Regent University 32,780 39,900 47,000 0.0%
106. Mississippi College 29,150 38,200 46,700 2.7%
107. Ohio Northern University 32,750 39,300 46,400 -2.7%
108. Howard University 29,131 37,200 46,000 -4.5%
109. University of Dayton 31,598 40,100 45,900 14.2%
110. University of Tulsa 32,056 38,400 45,100 -1.6%
111. Willamette University 32,540 38,000 43,800 -1.5%
112. Appalachian School of Law 29,825 36,600 43,500 -0.7%
113. Liberty University 30,604 37,000 43,500 -0.7%
114. St. Mary’s University 29,406 36,500 43,000 3.4%
115. Texas Wesleyan University 28,790 35,500 42,300 -0.3%
116. Brigham Young University 21,200 30,300 38,100 10.4%
117. South Texas 26,850 32,700 38,000 4.1%
118. Pontifical Catholic University of PR 14,446
119. Interamerican University of PR 14,403
120. Brigham Young University 10,600
MEDIAN 39,550 49,000 58,100 0.9%
MEAN 39,697 49,060 58,175 1.2%
AVG DEVIATION 5,050 6,168 75,24 2.1%

For the handful of public law schools, here you go:

# NAME RESIDENT TUITION: 2011-2011 RESIDENT TUITION: 2016-2017 RESIDENT TUITION: 2021-2022
1. CA-Berkeley 50,163
2. Michigan 46,830 60,010 72,302
3. CA-Davis 46,485
4. CA-Los Angeles 44,922
5. Virginia 44,600 58,924 72,995
6. CA-Irvine 43,280
7. CA-Hastings 40,836 50,486 60,136

That’s all I’ve got. Peace.

4 comments

  1. ML,

    Everyone appreciates the hard work you do bringing this information to light.

    Now, having extensively illustrated the suicidal perfidy of legal academia, I wonder if you might at least partially turn your high powered analytical tools to examining the *law firm* market itself.

    For the hundreds of thousands of law grads lured into the profession by academic frauds, the detailed nature and health of their prospective employers (law firms – of all sizes) is of absolute importance.

    The fundamental question is whether or not these grads have “merely” been financially maimed or definitively murdered by their alma maters (who make Joan Crawford look like St. Mary).

    Outside the AmLaw 100 or NLJ Top 250 there is precious little descriptive data about the detailed composition, specializations, etc. of the private sector firms that make up the bulk of the legal profession in the US. (I seem to recall there used to be a Corporate Law 1000 but I can’t seem to locate it anymore…)

    And as for the apparently vast universe of firms with 10 or fewer lawyers – and solos – there is almost no statistical data.

    (Martindale Hubbell, etc. would seem well equipped to perform this sort of law firm census, but they appear spectacularly inert.)

    **Witness the amazing numerical disparity between the number of law graduates reported by the ABA (approx 1.5 *million* over the last 40 years),**

    Click to access enrollment_degrees_awarded.authcheckdam.pdf

    **the approximately 1.25 million currently *licensed* lawyers,**

    Click to access lawyer_demographics_2012_revised.authcheckdam.pdf

    **the mere 728,000 lawyers considered employed by the BLS,**

    http://www.bls.gov/ooh/legal/lawyers.htm

    **and the somewhat lower number of lawyers considered employed by the ABA**

    http://www.abajournal.com/magazine/article/what_americas_lawyers_earn/

    There are *hundreds of thousands* of JDs (perhaps 33% to 50%) of *all JDs*, whose professional fate is *unknown*.

    At this point we are all well aware of the law schools’ sociopathic recruiting practices and their cancerous unconcern over the financial fates of their graduates – what we *need* is greater analytical insight into the market for small firms (<10 or 20) and solos.

    Could you please spend *some* time researching *that* area?

    It might also prove more personally productive to look "forward" (to sources of employment demand) as well as "backward" (to the origins of ruinous oversupply).

    In any event, thank you for the efforts you have already made.

    Reply

    1. Hey cas127,

      I charted out lawyer population information a while back. Here and here.

      Law firm data are harder to come by, but there’s some stuff in the BEA, Census Bureau and the IRS of all places I could look into. I think the American Bar Foundation did something like that but that was in 2000.

      According to the Current Population Survey, which I think overstates the number of employed lawyers, of the 1,086,000 employed lawyers in 2011, 173,000 were self-employed and incorporated while another 179,000 were self-employed and unincorporated. The rest were employed by either law firms or government. The 173,000 includes biglaw partners, but we’re not looking at huge numbers of people and very, very little turnover.

      Reply

  2. $weeTTT God! The truly astounding part is that those schools who will be charging $45K in 2016-2017 – or $50K for 2021-2022 – will be claiming that they are “affordable.” (We already recognize that wages will not increase anywhere near this rate.) Of course, the pigs will be asserting this merely in relation to the cockroaches who will charge $60K per year, in tuition.

    Reply
  3. Pingback: The Growing Cost of Law School - The 10 Most Costly Law Schools - Blog - Heritage Education Funds Inc.

Leave a Reply

Fill in your details below or click an icon to log in:

Gravatar
WordPress.com Logo

You are commenting using your WordPress.com account. ( Log Out /  Change )

Facebook photo

You are commenting using your Facebook account. ( Log Out /  Change )

Cancel

Connecting to %s