How to Be a Better Law Student: Numbers Matter as Much as Words

I cringe whenever a law student says, "I'm in law school because I don't do numbers."

I want to tell them they came to the wrong law school. We do numbers. They should too.

Since they prefer arguments, I will make three. But I also will close with an expression of sympathy. I do not blame them one bit.

First, you cannot be a good lawyer without doing numbers. I mean "be a lawyer" in the most conventional sense. Most people who are averse to numbers, it seems, mean more than mathematics.

They mean logic more generally. They prefer qualitative description to quantitative measurements, evocative rather than analytic. Or some of them even thrill less to words than we might hope. They are visual rather than verbal, immersed in images.

Numbers — and everything else they signify (any literary-minded thinker will appreciate symbolism) — are directly relevant to some areas of law. Anyone who performs patent prosecution must have a STEM (science, technology, engineering, math) background of some sort.

But numbers are essential to those who might not reckon they will need to calculate anything. Suppose someone antagonistic to business is committed enough to become a trial lawyer specializing in civil rights or personal injury or consumer protection. Each time they target a corporation, they will need to assess the value of the case. That includes the probability of success and the likely recovery. Some class actions are not worth pursuing, because the defendant is "judgment proof," which is to say it lacks sufficient assets to be worth suing, or since the investment needed to earn the contingency fee exceeds the amount of damage.

The initial client consultation is about applied economics as much as it is about the allegations. Later negotiation and settlement will be about sums of money and perhaps an apology.

Technology has altered quintessentially lawyer tasks. Pre-trial discovery (of evidence) has become "e-discovery" of digital files. Keyword search and algorithms have been developed for the advent of "big data." A lawyer who wants to lead, and not be relegated to the role of operating a machine, needs to grasp the principles behind these mechanisms.

Second, you cannot be a good small business owner without doing numbers. Lawyers in private practice are business owners even if they are proud to belong to the professional class. Many lawyers are solo practitioners or in firms with a few colleagues. They are quite aware of revenues and expenditures, and the ideal relationship between them, even if they hire an accountant to do the books.

Lawyers in elite firms need to be no less alert about the finances. The seemingly incomprehensible demise of these prestigious businesses is literally not unaccountable. It's just the opposite, attributable at least in part to the confidence of individuals who are smart in everything but numbers.

Even with a sizable firm, each individual member of the enterprise is the equivalent of a solo practitioner within a closed marketplace. The partners in this internal structure are akin to clients. They have business to offer to the associates, who compete with one another to be busy and thus compensated and in turn advanced upward in a pyramid.

The Nobel laureate, Ronald Coase, who introduced this framework was able to communicate mathematical ideas in straightforward prose. He demonstrated how elegant the best math could be, through words. (The Coase theorem is worth study even if its critics are right, because societies must address "externalities" regardless of how they set defaults.)

The more firms adapt their business model, such as with alternative billing, the more they will rely on non-legal skill sets. Law firms increasingly look for those who are capable of management. At a minimum, someone running a case or a deal needs to be familiar with project management.

Third, you cannot be a good citizen without doing numbers. Our democracy depends on more than recognizing rights and fulfilling responsibilities; it requires that we, individually and collectively, do so thoughtfully. That involves determining the facts and deliberating on the basis of data. Anyone who cares about equality and equity should be mindful of limits on resources and how budgets can be reasonably predicted to play out, because equality can be achieved by distributing misery on an equal basis and inequities will only intensify if irrational assumptions are made about the future.

The phenomenon of "freakonomics" has made the "dismal science" of economics popular. The time value of money matters. The choice between accounting on a cash basis and an accrual basis makes all the difference for the sustainability of pension programs and the visibility of the problem (the latter is better). Whether a person or government favors the gold standard and the Bretton Woods system, or accepts the dollar with its floating rate, it is useful to be at least conversant with the concepts.

Our innumeracy makes us vulnerable to fallacies. It compounds itself, because we disbelieve our ignorance. Black swan events, the law of large numbers, the Monte Carlo fallacy, and all sorts of related errors in reasoning influence our decision-making. The problem of the second half of the chessboard fools virtually everyone the first time they encounter it.

Our only consolation is that psychologists are discovering how these are predictable prejudices. We are wired to see patterns. That serves us well much of the time.

Yet I am sympathetic to those who shy away from algebra, much less calculus. My own technical knowledge of math is no better than a few semesters of the latter. Although I tested at the top for aptitude as a kid, I recall telling a grade school teacher that I hated math.

I blame the pedagogy. Formal education discourages natural interest.

Most of the "math" I am concerned about, for lawyers, can be learned simply and through easy examples. When I was in high school, I had an excellent instructor in probability and statistics. We gambled on poker (with fake stakes, though real money would impart the lessons much more effectively). As a law professor, I cannot devise any better means for teaching. The key is appreciating that math is more practical than theoretical.

Once law students see the use to them personally, to advance their own goals, of numbers, I am confident they will want to be as precise with numbers as they are with words. They — and, more importantly, their clients — will benefit.