On occasion I think HN goes overboard on the reward side of entrepreneurship too, and that's not right when that happens either. Tell the truth, let people make up their minds. (And to be clear, I mean it just happens sometimes. On the whole there's too many people doing it for real for raw cheerleading to go unchallenged for long.)
People have been getting led on about the value of their degree for a while now. The economic situation is bringing things to a head but it's not new.
Also, I doubt this is a serious call for a refund, in the sense that he has even the remote expectation of one. This is a warning to others dressed up with a rhetorical flourish.
That said, this guy doesn't seem cut out for the trade in the first place, although it's possible that that I'm wrong and this is actually a shrewd exercise in personal branding.
So it's quite different than what happens to entrepreneurs, they can fail and comeback several times, tabula rasa. Someone saddled with student debt is forced to live with that choice until they pay it off or they die.
I doubt he will be refunded, nor do I think he should.
I fail to see how sticking it out and finishing something like a JD is somehow worse in the long run (financially) than leaving with somewhere around 100k (I assume) that you will have to pay back to creditors with interest.
He would still walk away with knowledge, degree or not, and the school is out the time and effort to have imparted that knowledge. It's like asking for a refund if you don't achieve the degree. "I failed, I didn't get the degree, so can I be refunded?"
1) Do not get into law right now. It is experiencing an outsourcing much like tech did in the early 2000s.
2) ONLY, and seriously ONLY, go if you truly love to study law. You will NOT find a job, and most likely you will have to do crap work for awhile.
What made me decide to hold off law school was the fact that I would accumulate too much debt and not be able to pay it off in a timely matter.
A LOT of law students that I spoke to had his grandiose dream and vision of a top job making hundreds of thousands.
One friend told me up front, he chose not to listen, he thought that everyone was just being pessimistic telling him not to get into law, he like most young students, didnt realize how bad it was, no matter how many warnings they got.
NYTimes links
Is Law School a Losing Game?: http://www.nytimes.com/2011/01/09/business/09law.html?_r=1
I Want My Money Back (On Everything): http://www.nytimes.com/2011/01/09/business/09law.html
My thoughts: http://jaynesyourway.blogspot.com/2011/01/hear-one-about-law...
http://lawprofessors.typepad.com/legal_profession/2009/06/th...
Just default on the loans and move to a deserted island if you don't want to pay them.
