No compassion

In the last couple of weeks I’ve been contacted by students at two of the three Infilaw law schools, who have complaints about policies at the schools that, in their view, are designed to extract as much money as possible from weak students before they are flunked out, and to make it more difficult for strong students to transfer to other law schools after their first year.

I more than suspect that these complaints are valid. I would actually be quite surprised if they weren’t. I mean these are explicitly for-profit operations. For . . . profit. Geddit? So every profit-maximizing strategy that’s just this side of legal fraud should not only be expected, but may even be required as a matter of the entity’s fiduciary obligation to its owners (I confess to not remembering corporate law real well, so this may be an exaggeration, but whatever, you get the point).

These student would like some help in fighting the Man. But I have a confession: I’m running low on compassion. Look, you’re going to schools that are pretty much scams on their face. Are you twelve years old? Or eighty-five? Have you not had any internet access in recent years? No? Well what is your excuse then? Yes I know you have excuses, and they’re even quite valid to a point: after all the ABA and the DOE certify these places as legitimate educational institutions, which means the federal government will lend you $200,000 to go to them, which certainly suggests to people in their younger and more vulnerable years that this is all on the level, surely. Or something.

I know about lack of cultural and social capital, as well as the regular kind. I know about optimism bias and confirmation bias, and the sunk cost fallacy. Blessed are the poor (OK more realistically the lower-middle class) in spirit. But there are days when I just want to shrug my shoulders, mumble something about “personal responsibility,” and have another gin and tonic. It must be nice to be a Republican sometimes.