Robert Anderson, a law professor at Pepperdine, analyzes the legal job market as a function of changing demographics within the legal industry:

The number of lawyers between 55 and 75 has swelled in 2012 far beyond the numbers in 2003. By my count, tens of thousands more lawyers are now 55 and older compared to 2003, and this is just in California. That means that the reported oversupply of lawyers may well result from demographic factors, rather than permanent changes in the legal market. The demographic factors, in turn, probably result from a combination of lawyers waiting longer to retire because of 401(k) accounts decimated during the financial crisis together with the "bulge" of baby boomers working their way through the system.

If this demographic pattern is responsible for displacing jobs for young law graduates, it would seem to be good news for recent and prospective law school graduates, albeit good news that may take some years to materialize. With the financial markets having recovered near all-time highs, baby boomers may now have the financial resources to retire. That may free up jobs for new law school graduates. And even if they don't retire, it is unlikely the baby boomer "bulge" will persist in the workforce for another 10 years because of the inevitable march of time.

Of course, there are those who argue that there have been permanent, structural changes to the legal market that will reduce the number of legal jobs, and there is no denying that law school tuition remains daunting. But the demographic factors suggest the real culprit in the law school graduates' jobs dilemma of today may be the law school graduates of four decades ago.

The whole thing can be found here.