I've got 1 more year of schooling left before I can really get involved in this conversation. Through the last few years I've made an effort to get as much diverse work experience as I could. Figured it was the best way to really figure out what I enjoy doing while also diversifying my resume
- Interned at a PI firm last summer. Wasn't a big fan of spending my days reaching out to doctors and insurance... not a line of work I ever see myself setting into. I know there's money to be made there, but that isn't my only motivation for going to law school. worked for the superior court (labor/equity division). The firm was nice, though. I started off as a standard unpaid intern but they appreciated my effort and started paying me anyway.
- This past fall I worked at the superior court (received units for school, so no pay). I was assigned to the labor/equity division and I hated it. Basically just dealing with employment issues for county workers... discipline, discrimination, retaliation, etc. Just a bunch of HR and the main thing I learned is that it's next to damn impossible to fire a county employee no matter how ty they are
- Had a GREAT experience this past spring, clerking for a judge at the superior court. He was doing probate but got transferred to civil, so for most of the semester I saw nothing but jury trials with some big money involved (first case ended up settling for something around 6 mil... but the dude lost his leg so he deserved it

). Coolest part was actually drafting one of his statements of decision for a previous probate matter... it's not something a lot of law students get to do. But the trials were a great learning experience, considering I was also taking Evidence and Trial Practice as courses this semester. But I didn't get paid for this gig, got units again.
- Currently working for a workers comp insurance and general civil lit firm. Getting 20/hour on a full time basis which is pretty good coin for a student. I'm only about a week in at this point so I can't really comment much, but so far the work seems interesting. My assignments have been very research oriented to this point, haven't really gotten hands-on in the litigation process yet.
goal is to extern either for the DA or Public Defender's office this coming fall. Pretty sure I'd like defense work better but students can do a lot more working for the DA (can actually argue in prelim hearings), so I might go that way just for the experience
but

at people saying they can't live off 80k per year. If you're a single male there's no reason why "you can't live" off it. Yeah, you dont get all the luxuries and , but how much of a princess do you have to be to actually say you can't live
