--- title: "Lawyer" description: "Represent clients in criminal and civil litigation and other legal proceedings, draw up legal documents, or manage or advise clients on legal…" canonical: "https://nuecareer.com/careers/lawyer" last-updated: "2026-08-23T15:56:39.581Z" --- # Lawyer **Category:** Legal · **SOC code:** 23-1011 · **O\*NET-SOC code:** 23-1011.00 Represent clients in criminal and civil litigation and other legal proceedings, draw up legal documents, or manage or advise clients on legal transactions. May specialize in a single area or may practice broadly in many areas of law. Also advertised as: Attorney; Attorney at Law; Attorney General; Counsel; County Attorney; District Attorney; General Counsel; Lawyer. ## At a glance - **Median annual wage:** $159,670 (BLS OEWS, May 2025) - **Median hourly wage:** $76.76/hr - **Wage range (10th–90th percentile):** $78,360 to $351,600, with the middle half between $102,990 and $221,370 - **Total US employment:** 754,500 - **Typical entry education:** Doctorate - **Preparation required:** Considerable preparation — O\*NET rates this "Job Zone Five: Extensive Preparation Needed" - **Projected growth:** +4.1% over 2024–2034 (BLS EP, 2024–2034) - **Annual job openings:** 31,500 openings a year - **AI-resilience score:** 28/100 — a NueCareer heuristic over O\*NET work activities and context, not a BLS or O\*NET figure ## Pay National wage distribution, BLS OEWS, May 2025, across 754,500 US jobs. | Percentile | Annual wage | | --- | --- | | 10th | $78,360 | | 25th | $102,990 | | 50th (median) | $159,670 | | 75th | $221,370 | | 90th | $351,600 | | Mean (average) | $185,840 | ### Pay by state The 15 highest-paying states, by median annual wage. The cost-of-living-adjusted column divides the state median by that state's BEA Regional Price Parity, so the columns answer different questions: the first is what the job pays there, the second is what that pay buys there. | State | Median annual wage | Cost-of-living adjusted | Employment | | --- | --- | --- | --- | | NY | $207,860 | $192,604 | 91,870 | | DC | $195,190 | $177,605 | 33,070 | | CA | $195,080 | $176,192 | 95,770 | | MA | $176,680 | $167,062 | 23,560 | | DE | $173,510 | $173,844 | 2,920 | | CO | $168,520 | $163,529 | 16,720 | | VA | $167,210 | $165,384 | 18,580 | | CT | $163,600 | $157,900 | 8,420 | | NJ | $161,430 | $148,366 | 23,160 | | IL | $160,800 | $160,868 | 33,590 | | PA | $157,180 | $161,091 | 27,170 | | MN | $155,140 | $157,309 | 12,380 | | TX | $154,200 | $158,876 | 56,580 | | WA | $154,130 | $144,029 | 12,770 | | NV | $150,510 | $150,542 | 6,490 | 38 more states with published wage data are omitted here. The full table for all 53 states is at https://nuecareer.com/careers/lawyer/salary-by-state, or as JSON at https://nuecareer.com/api/v1/careers/lawyer. ## Outlook BLS projects employment to move from 864,800 in the 2024–2034 base year to 900,700 by the end of the cycle — a gain of 35,900 jobs, or +4.1%. Faster than average: 4.1% against 3.1% projected for all occupations over the same cycle. About 31,500 openings a year are expected on average, counting openings from growth as well as from workers leaving the occupation permanently. Source: BLS EP, 2024–2034. ## How to get in - **Typical entry education:** Doctoral or professional degree (BLS Employment Projections). - **Preparation level:** Considerable preparation — O\*NET's preparation band for this occupation is "Job Zone Five: Extensive Preparation Needed". - **Related work experience typically required:** None. - **Typical on-the-job training:** None. ### Education people in this job actually hold O\*NET surveys incumbents, so this distribution describes who is in the job today and can differ from the BLS entry requirement above. | Education level | Share of workers | | --- | --- | | Doctoral Degree | 77.2% | | First Professional Degree | 22.8% | ## What the work involves - Interpret laws, rulings and regulations for individuals and businesses. - Analyze the probable outcomes of cases, using knowledge of legal precedents. - Confer with colleagues with specialties in appropriate areas of legal issue to establish and verify bases for legal proceedings. - Examine legal data to determine advisability of defending or prosecuting lawsuit. - Study Constitution, statutes, decisions, regulations, and ordinances of quasi-judicial bodies to determine ramifications for cases. - Prepare, draft, and review legal documents, such as wills, deeds, patent applications, mortgages, leases, and contracts. - Supervise legal assistants. - Negotiate contractual agreements. ## Skills and knowledge ### Essential skills - Speaking — importance 4.6 on the O\*NET 1–5 importance scale - Reading Comprehension — importance 4.5 on the O\*NET 1–5 importance scale - Active Listening — importance 4.5 on the O\*NET 1–5 importance scale - Critical Thinking — importance 4.5 on the O\*NET 1–5 importance scale - Writing — importance 4.3 on the O\*NET 1–5 importance scale - Active Learning — importance 3.8 on the O\*NET 1–5 importance scale - Monitoring — importance 3.4 on the O\*NET 1–5 importance scale - Learning Strategies — importance 3.1 on the O\*NET 1–5 importance scale ### Transferable skills These are the skills that carry into other occupations, and they drive the related-occupation and career-change rankings on this site. - Complex Problem Solving — importance 4.1 on the O\*NET 1–5 importance scale - Judgment and Decision Making — importance 4.1 on the O\*NET 1–5 importance scale - Persuasion — importance 4.0 on the O\*NET 1–5 importance scale - Negotiation — importance 4.0 on the O\*NET 1–5 importance scale - Social Perceptiveness — importance 3.8 on the O\*NET 1–5 importance scale - Time Management — importance 3.6 on the O\*NET 1–5 importance scale - Coordination — importance 3.5 on the O\*NET 1–5 importance scale - Systems Analysis — importance 3.4 on the O\*NET 1–5 importance scale ### Knowledge areas - Law and Government — importance 5.0 on the O\*NET 1–5 importance scale - English Language — importance 4.7 on the O\*NET 1–5 importance scale - Customer and Personal Service — importance 4.0 on the O\*NET 1–5 importance scale - Administrative — importance 3.2 on the O\*NET 1–5 importance scale - Computers and Electronics — importance 3.1 on the O\*NET 1–5 importance scale - Communications and Media — importance 3.0 on the O\*NET 1–5 importance scale ### Abilities - Oral Expression — importance 4.9 on the O\*NET 1–5 importance scale - Oral Comprehension — importance 4.6 on the O\*NET 1–5 importance scale - Written Comprehension — importance 4.6 on the O\*NET 1–5 importance scale - Written Expression — importance 4.5 on the O\*NET 1–5 importance scale - Speech Clarity — importance 4.4 on the O\*NET 1–5 importance scale - Deductive Reasoning — importance 4.1 on the O\*NET 1–5 importance scale ## Who it suits O\*NET rates every occupation on the six Holland (RIASEC) interest areas, on a 1–7 scale. This occupation's strongest areas are Enterprising (E), Conventional (C), Investigative (I). | Interest area | Score (1–7) | | --- | --- | | E — Enterprising | 5.51 | | C — Conventional | 4.59 | | I — Investigative | 4.38 | | S — Social | 3.48 | | A — Artistic | 2.40 | | R — Realistic | 1.12 | ### Personality fit These scores are **derived by NueCareer**, not published by any government agency: they are cosine similarities between a personality type's trait profile and this occupation's O\*NET interest and work-style ratings, expressed 0–100. Treat them as a starting point for exploration, not as evidence that a type belongs in a job. | Type | Fit score (0–100) | | --- | --- | | ENTJ | 71.0 | | ENFJ | 65.9 | | ESTJ | 65.7 | | ESFJ | 63.5 | | INTJ | 52.2 | Best-fitting types: ENTJ. ## Related occupations O\*NET's primary related occupations, in its own ranked order. - [Judicial Law Clerk](https://nuecareer.com/careers/judicial-law-clerk) — median $64,920 - [Administrative Law Judge, Adjudicator, and Hearing Officer](https://nuecareer.com/careers/administrative-law-judge-adjudicator-and-hearing-officer) — median $117,860 - [Judge](https://nuecareer.com/careers/judge) — median $153,990 - [Arbitrator, Mediator, and Conciliator](https://nuecareer.com/careers/arbitrator-mediator-and-conciliator) — median $75,530 - [Equal Opportunity Representative and Officer](https://nuecareer.com/careers/equal-opportunity-representative-and-officer) — median $80,730 - [Claims Adjuster, Examiner, and Investigator](https://nuecareer.com/careers/claims-adjuster-examiner-and-investigator) — median $78,000 - [Law Teacher, Postsecondary](https://nuecareer.com/careers/law-teacher-postsecondary) — median $128,500 - [Labor Relations Specialist](https://nuecareer.com/careers/labor-relations-specialist) — median $95,420 - [Fraud Examiner, Investigator and Analyst](https://nuecareer.com/careers/fraud-examiner-investigator-and-analyst) — median $81,100 - [Chief Executive](https://nuecareer.com/careers/chief-executive) — median $213,990 ## Sources - **O\*NET** — O\*NET 30.3 Database, May 2026. https://www.onetcenter.org/database.html - **BLS OEWS** — BLS Occupational Employment and Wage Statistics, May 2025. https://www.bls.gov/oes/ - **BLS EP** — BLS Employment Projections, Table 1.2, 2024–2034. https://www.bls.gov/emp/ - **BLS OOH** — BLS Occupational Outlook Handbook, 2024–2034 edition. https://www.bls.gov/ooh/ - **BEA RPP** — BEA Regional Price Parities by State, 2024. https://www.bea.gov/data/prices-inflation/regional-price-parities-state-and-metro-area --- This bank includes information from the O\*NET 30.3 Database by the U.S. Department of Labor, Employment and Training Administration (USDOL/ETA). Used under the CC BY 4.0 license (https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/4.0/). O\*NET® is a trademark of USDOL/ETA. NueCareer has transformed the data by joining it to BLS wage and projection data and deriving facet, personality-fit and AI-resilience scores. BLS and BEA data are public domain (17 U.S.C. §105). O\*NET content is used under [CC BY 4.0](https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/4.0/). How these figures are sourced and derived: https://nuecareer.com/careers/methodology JSON representation of this page: https://nuecareer.com/api/v1/careers/lawyer