Female Lawyers Suffer Bias, Study Finds

Although women are entering law schools in larger numbers than men, female lawyers earn less than their male counterparts and make up only a tiny percentage of law firm partners, law school deans and judges, according to a report Thursday by the American Bar Assn.

“On average, female lawyers earn about $20,000 less than male lawyers, and significant disparities persist even between those with similar qualifications, experience and positions,” said the report, which was described by the ABA as the most comprehensive study ever performed on the status of women in the legal profession.

The report, a compilation of various studies and surveys, found that obstacles for women in the law include unconscious stereotypes, inadequate access to support networks, inflexible work structures, sexual harassment and bias in the court system.

Women constitute 30% of U.S. lawyers but only 15% of law firm partners, 10% of law school deans and corporate general counsels, and 5% of managing partners at firms, according to the report.

Almost half the women in the legal profession are unmarried, compared with 15% of men, the report said, and women with children are often afraid to work part time because they believe they will be penalized.

The report also found that nearly 75% of female lawyers have found sexual harassment to be a problem in the workplace.

“I really think the central message is that the woman problem is still a problem, despite enormous progress,” said Stanford law professor Deborah L. Rhode, who heads the ABA’s Commission on Women, which released the report.

Discrimination against women in the legal profession is more subtle than overt, the report said. It includes the way some judges treat female lawyers: They call female lawyers, but not males, by their first names in court.

“Women also report recurring instances of being ignored, interrupted or mistaken for nonprofessional support staff” in court, the report said.

Female lawyers who also are racial minorities face the most barriers, the report said.

Kay Lucas, who practices employment law in San Francisco, said many of the findings did not surprise her because she often represents female lawyers who are having trouble at their law firms.

“There’s a lot of feeling that the plum assignments are given to Ivy League white males,” she said.

Women have been entering law schools in large numbers for several years, and more female lawyers alone will not solve the problems of disparate pay and promotions, Lucas said.

Large law firms now expect lawyers to bring in new clients, and men tend to have an advantage because the business world is largely run by men, she said.

“It is no secret that most law firms have become much more like a business, and every lawyer is supposed to be a salesman,” Lucas said. Compensation and promotion often depend on how many clients a lawyer brings in.

Female lawyers in Northern California have had a particularly difficult time attracting high-tech firms as clients because the industry is largely male, she said.

She predicts that women’s status in the law will improve as smaller firms run by women grow.

Not all women lawyers say they have experienced unequal treatment.

“Look at the Los Angeles Superior Court,” said Patricia Glaser, one of the founding partners of Los Angeles’ Christensen, Miller, Fink, Jacobs, Glaser, Weil & Shapiro. “There are a lot of women. There are a lot of women at my law firm, and they are certainly getting equal pay.”

Glaser, a business litigator, said she also feels no discrimination from male judges. That may be because she is 52, has been around the courts a long time, and is known and respected, Glaser said.

She said the first firm she worked for after law school had a strong female managing partner, “and she made it much easier for the rest of us.” Male lawyers at the firm were accustomed to having a woman have the final say, she said.

That may not be the case in many smaller cities around the country, she said.

The report cited surveys that found that two-thirds of lawyers experience conflict between the demands of their jobs and their homes, and most believe it is this juggling act that keeps women in the lower echelon of the legal profession.

Although more than 90% of law firms surveyed said they had policies that allowed part-time work, only about 3% to 4% of lawyers take advantage of them, the report found. Women believe that working a reduced week will jeopardize prospects for promotion, the survey found.

Female lawyers are not more likely to leave the profession than are men, but they change jobs to take positions with flexible schedules, the report said.

“A wide array of research indicates that part-time employees are more productive than their full-time counterparts, particularly those working sweatshop schedules,” the report said.

Mary P. Carey, a deputy public defender in Contra Costa County with two young children, has worked nearly seven years part time and nine years full time.

She returned to full-time work recently because her department, which she described as progressive, requires part-time public defenders to represent juvenile offenders instead of adults.

Although juvenile defense work offers flexibility, Carey said it is less challenging professionally.

“You must make an election between having career satisfaction and flexible hours,” she said. “That is very frustrating, especially for women who have heretofore been really gung-ho on their career.”

She said the two judges who hear criminal cases in the Bay Area county are both women, and “it’s great to be in front of them.”

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Women and Law

Percentages of women in different areas of the legal profession:

Profession overall: 30%

Federal judges: 15%

Law firm partners: 15%

Law school deans: 10%

General counsels: 10%

Managing partners at law firms: 5%

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OTHER FINDINGS:

Women are the majority of entering law students.

Until the early 1960s, women made up 3% of the profession.

Women lawyers make about $20,000 a year less than male lawyers.

Racially and ethnically diverse women account for 3% of the legal profession.

About 30% of women lawyers surveyed doubted that it was realistic to combine successfully the role of lawyer, wife and mother.

Almost 75% of women lawyers believe that harassment is a problem in their workplaces.

Sources: ABA Journal’s 2000 poll, ABA Commission on Women in the Profession, A Snapshot of Women in the Law in the Year 2000

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Times legal affairs writer Henry Weinstein contributed to this story.