More than 50 percent of graduates from at least 30 accredited law schools did not get jobs requiring a law degree in 2009, Brian Tamanaha, a Washington University School of Law professor, said.

Tamanaha drew the conclusion from data assembled by U.S. News & World Report.

That year, 80 percent of Washington University School of Law graduates found employment as lawyers. U.S. News currently ranks the law school 18th in the nation.

But even at Harvard and Yale Universities, which have the country’s two top-ranked law schools, the employment rate of graduates as lawyers was in the low 90 percent range.

“It was a bad year for everyone,” said Tamanaha. “A lot of graduates don’t become lawyers.”

While the data for 2010 has not come out yet, Professor Tamanaha predicts that the figures will be worse than those from 2009. He said that students should consider the negative employment trend when deciding whether to pursue law degrees.

“The main message I am trying to deliver here is trying to make a smart decision. Students should…weigh the cost or how much debt they are paying before applying,” Tamanaha said. “It is a big investment of both time and money.”

A Juris Doctor typically requires three years beyond an undergraduate degree and costs around $100,000. Tamanaha offered possible factors that had led to this job depression.

“In 2008 and 2009, when the recession occurred, there was also a recession in legal market. Thousands of lawyers were laid off, and the main factor was probably the oversupply of lawyers,” Tamanaha said. “It used to be a good thing to be a lawyer in bad economy. However, today, it’s not necessarily the case.”

Despite the statistic, first-year law student Elad Gross said he is not feeling too much anxiety about finding a job in the legal field.

“It’s not time to be panicked, [but] it’s time to be urgent,” Gross said. “I can see that a lot of students are stressed out. But…we are still investigating.–Though we are hearing or being told about the rumors, I don’t want to be panicked when it’s not necessary.”

Gross received his bachelor’s degree in economics at Duke University, and started his own non-profit education organization that takes college students and places them in local middle schools as teaching assistants and instructors.

He said he is not studying law to become a lawyer, but instead to learn how to more effectively help students achieve success in school.

Some current undergraduates also noted that they are unconcerned about the statistic.

“Having a JD degree opens doors to other professions as well, besides being a lawyer,” sophomore Quanhao Tang said. “To me, students truly interested in law schools are unlikely [to be] discouraged by the unfavorable employment data and make decisions purely based on the employability of having a JD degree.”