Should I give McMaster medicine a shot? Aspiring lawyer.

[Marco]

1 hour ago, zoxy said:

Mos third party CARS prep materials are trash imo. Only good sources of prep is the AAMC CARS material, and that's just the 2 CARS question banks and the 4 practice exams. The QBanks are actually horrible though. I think I was getting 60 percent on the first one and ended up with a 131 in the real thing. I personally used LSAT materials once I exhausted the AAMC material.

A 175 or whatever you got on the LSAT should make a 131 or 132 very feasible. Don't sweat it, most premeds can't read.

Yeah, I have an acquaintance going for law schools this cycle who used to be on the premed track, scored a 522 on the MCAT and did well on CARS. Said it was very similar to the RC section on the LSAT.

1 hour ago, hero147 said:

Have you thought about working in Canada as a lawyer on baystreet? The pay is definitely worse but you can still make 110-130k as a first year associate and could become a partner down the line. You would likely make more than a family doctor and work less than you would at Big Law down in the States. I have a friend my age who is a fourth year associate on Bay street and he's definitely doing better than me finanically and for the foreseeable future. 

For sure, I'm not 100% set on the US. It depends on where I get accepted and what scholarships / funding I get. The main reason I'm looking at the US isn't even because of the salaries or the quality of the legal work there, it's the surer pathway to land top law positions. I'm super risk averse. In Canada, university prestige doesn't secure employment outcomes with the same kind of reliability as in the US (even though it's still important). UofT is the best corporate law feeder for Bay St. and only about 50% of its class places there, with the rest being taken up by top performers at other Ontario uni's. So if I go to UofT I'd still have to bust ass getting good grades, competing with the best Canadian students on a tight curve. I'm confident in myself but there's no guarantee I won't be a weak law student.

In the US, getting into a T6 or even a T14 is a far surer pathway to Wall St. biglaw than UofT is for Bay St. Even the lower quartile performers at some of those universities get those jobs since the recruiters reach deeper than Bay St. does with UofT. And there's no articling period over there. So I'm looking at an 80%+ chance to make almost 300k CAD first year vs 50%+ chance to make 90k in Bay St. as an articling student 1st year. The legal market is very good rn so I've spoken to many Canadians that lateraled to the US and they report the workloads aren't THAT much higher. And if you get experience at a top NYC law firm you could still return to the Bay St. scene afterwards (my current intention).

Being a partner isn't something I've thought much about, it seems too tough to make it + more work than I'm willing to put in. My plan was to just endure biglaw until I can exit to a decent in-house lawyer position. I haven't looked at physician salaries but family docs seem to have much better W/L balance which is important to me even if the financial dimension is lower than a partner or senior associate.

[zoxy]

3 hours ago, Marco said:

Yeah, I have an acquaintance going for law schools this cycle who used to be on the premed track, scored a 522 on the MCAT and did well on CARS. Said it was very similar to the RC section on the LSAT.

May I ask what made them drop out of the med school track? I'd be curious to hear how they rationalized law to be the better option than medicine.

[Marco]

Just now, zoxy said:

May I ask what made them drop out of the med school track? I'd be curious to hear how they rationalized law to be the better option than medicine.

I don't have many details since this was just someone I met on a forum, and I didn't pry into their reasons. I know they're from the Maritimes and didn't get into Dal one cycle and ended up changing their path after that. They're working at a hospital in some capacity and wasn't enjoying it + looks like they have some specific aspirations in government law (they're a bilingual speaker). They were also very interested in McGill cause of its civil law program and had 0 interest in corporate law so I think it was more than a financial calculation to them.

I've heard of really cushy government lawyer gigs that pay well for good W/L balance, doing interesting / meaningful work as well. I doubt I could land something like that but they had a really unique non-trad background too so it's probably quite realistic for them.

[AnnyBear]

Since, as you mentioned, you are an aspiring lawyer, why don’t you simply stick to that?

[Marco]

6 hours ago, AnnyBear said:

Since, as you mentioned, you are an aspiring lawyer, why don’t you simply stick to that?

Bit rude... I almost certainly will be doing that, but I think I've made my reasons for sounding out medicine clear in this thread.

[C-3PO]

On 1/17/2022 at 7:11 PM, Marco said:

Bit rude... I almost certainly will be doing that, but I think I've made my reasons for sounding out medicine clear in this thread.

Well said, @Marco. Albeit I do not have the same issue, I've been thinking of applying to law instead of med. Your thread answered some of my questions right off the bat. So, thanks.