Study Finds Gender Bias Still Rampant in the Legal World

By: Heather Morse

A new study led by a sociologist at the University of Iowa has found that despite the legal profession’s success at hiring more women lawyers, these women remain less likely to be promoted to partner.

According to study leader associate professor of sociology Mary Noonan, women who practiced in a firm for five or more years were 13 percent less likely than men to make partner; even if their qualifications were equal, regardless of whether they had children.

Noonan arrived at these results by analyzing data that was gathered from Michigan Law School graduates. She had two groups — the classes of 1972-78 and 1979-85 — complete surveys, five and 15 years after their graduation respectively. 198 women and 1,187 men comprised the first group of graduates, while 304 women and 814 men rounded out the latter group.

According to the surveys of the ‘70s graduates, 75 percent of women and 87 percent of men practiced in a firm for at least one year. This contrasts to the ‘80s graduates, where 85 percent of women entered private practice, compared to 90 percent of men.

The females who graduated in the ‘80s were more likely to try out and less likely to leave private practice, which typically pays better than other legal careers but has traditionally been filled with males. The study also discovered that nearly 29% of women who earned law degrees during the ‘70s left private practice within four years, compared to only 11% of men. However, these numbers changed significantly during the ‘80s, when only 18 percent of women and 14 percent of men left within four years.

Noonan points out this good news by saying, “There’s no glass ceiling keeping women out of firms or pushing them out in the first couple of years.”

But, she goes on to state, “Unfortunately, those who stay aren’t making it to the top at the same rate as men. We found no gender inequality at the first stage of their careers, but that final stage seems out of reach for a lot of women. And that hasn’t changed at all over time.”

Men who graduated in the ‘70s and worked in a firm five or more years had a 67 percent chance of becoming partner, while women in the same situation only had a 54% chance of being named partner. Despite advances in workplace equality, this gap still remained for those who finished law school in the ‘80s. Then, females had a 40 percent chance of making partner compared to 53 percent for males. And disturbingly, 90 percent of women lawyers from the combination of both graduating classes reported they had experienced sexual discrimination from colleagues or clients.