According to the salary guide released by Robert Half Legal, 2013 should see an increase in paralegal salaries by 3.1 to 3.9 %, depending on the size of the firm you work for. You can get a copy of their salary guide here.
You can also use their salary calculator to obtain salaries in your local area as well and check out the hiring trends, not only in your area but nationwide and you can check out the fastest growing industries locally and nationwide as well.
One of our fellow paralegals, Chere Estrin, recently posted an interesting article on your weight and how it could be sabotaging your career in the legal field. It is a great article (which you can read in its entirety here) and I am sure that most of us (at least those of us who carry some extra pounds) have wondered about when we have applied for a job, interviewed and then were not hired, if it was because of our weight that lost us the job.
As quoted in Chere’s article:
While I am not looking for a new job, I am very happy where I am, thank you very much, I am giving this article some great thought. I am lucky to work for employers who did not discriminate when hiring me, despite my extra pounds. I wonder how some of you feel about this article and if you have felt, or have been told outright, that you were not hired/promoted because of your weight. Please feel free to share your thoughts on this.
Wow!! What a crazy, busy week it was at the office! We had two staff members out on the same day, one with a family member ill and the other with a raving toothache. That left us down to two staff members, (me being one of them) to grab the phones, prepare one attorney for trial and the other attorney for mediation. In between the preparation for both attorneys, there were of course other clients who needed assistance and a few opposing counsels with questions as well. Did I mention that I have discovery responses to prepare for review too? Oh yes, it made for a very fun week in this paralegals life.
It made for an interesting end of the week trying to catch up after the busy day too. It’s days like these that I appreciate where I work and the people I work with, always willing to assist and no matter what the task, do it without a thought about how their workload is going to be affected! I would like to give a big THANK YOU to MARY! I could not have done it this week without you! 
Don’t get me wrong, I am not complaining, never! I love what I do and I have said this a million times. I wouldn’t trade it for any other career, but when you are in the craziness, and you feel like you are drowning in it, it can sometimes feel like it will never end. It does end, it did end, (at least for this week, lol) and I am happy to have a day to sit back and reflect on the past week and get ready for the next one!
I can’t believe it is 2013 and another year has flown by. This past year has been a busy one, personally and professionally. So much so, that it has kept me from blogging as often as I would like. I am going to change that, or at least give it my best ‘college try’ as they say, in this new year.
I became a great grandmother to a beautiful girl in March 2012, Lexi Jo. She brings laughter and happiness to all of our lives. I am blessed to have her in my life and enjoy watching her grow each day. 
My family is healthy now, with my youngest son finally getting the insulin pump for his type 1 diabetes. Seems like we waited for this pump forever. This has helped to maintain his sugar levels and has prevented his having to be in intensive care on a monthly basis. I know he is happy about this and as his mother, I am thrilled that he no longer needs to be hospitalized frequently.
Professionally in 2012, the law office expanded by adding one more person to our cast of characters. She is young, smart and is a fast learner. She seems to be fitting in nicely with all of us. Our receptionist was promoted to assist me and begin using her paralegal skills. I know I am happy as can be with this change, and I know she is as well. I look forward to teaching her all I know and watching her grow in her new position. With these changes of course, come some challenges. Figuring out what job duties change and for whom, is one of the biggest challenges.
I hope that all of my paralegal friends are doing well in this new year and that 2013 brings us all happiness, not only personally, but professionally too. Happy New Year and I look forward to reconnecting with all of you and hopefully connecting with new paralegals as well!
The Bureau of Labor Statistics published their new handbook in March 2012 regarding Paralegal and Legal Assistants wages along with the anticipated growth in jobs from 2010-2020. For a quick summary I have attached their quick facts summary below.
| Quick Facts: Paralegals and Legal Assistants | |
|---|---|
| 2010 Median Pay | $46,680 per year $22.44 per hour |
| Entry-Level Education | Associate’s degree |
| Work Experience in a Related Occupation | None |
| On-the-job Training | None |
| Number of Jobs, 2010 | 256,000 |
| Job Outlook, 2010-20 | 18% (About as fast as average) |
| Employment Change, 2010-20 | 46,900 |
To see the Handbook, click here.
O’Net shows a difference in the projected job openings during this same 10 year period of almost almost double.
| Median wages (2011) | $22.47 hourly, $46,730 annual |
| Employment (2010) | 256,000 employees |
| Projected growth (2010-2020) |  Average (10% to 19%) |
| Projected job openings (2010-2020) | 83,400 |
| Top industries (2010) |
John Parker, a paralegal in Hempstead, NY, has been facing tough times since paid with a fraudulent check when he worked as a security guard for what he thought was a friend. This story caught my eye and I had to share it. 
John took a part-time job during the Summer of 2010 to help supplement his income as a paralegal when his new son was born. Seems the check he received was fraudulent, unbeknownst to him. He used the $4,600 paycheck earned over the summer to pay bills and school supplies for his daughter from another relationship.
The bank contacted him about the check but he was unable to pay it back right away and then the police showed up at his work to arrest him. His then employer helped him out by paying the money back to the bank and John paid semi-monthly payments to his boss to pay back the loan. John’s luck continued in a downward spiral and he eventually fell behind on his rent due to the high payments to his boss and eventually received an eviction notice. John managed to find another part-time job, but still was not able to catch up.
John eventually found F.E.G.S. Health and Human Services System, a beneficiary of UJA-Federation of New York, one of the seven agencies supported by The New York Times Neediest Cases Fund. This agency, along with his annual bonus from his paralegal job, helped John catch up on his rent and paid of the loan to his boss and then his landlord raised his rent.
When John received a rent increase he moved to a cheaper apartment and he learned in September that he and two co-workers were going to be laid off. Despite all of this, with the determination of all of us in this legal profession, John is determined to care for his children during these tough challenges even it it means he goes without food so that they do not.
I don’t know what paralegal Alexa Johzen Polar, 34, and elementary school teacher Robin Antonella Pabello, 33, were thinking when they decided to allegedly take a check written for $19,500 to Polar’s employer, change the amount to $285,000 and deposit it into their own account. Why they thought that they could charter a plane and fly some friends to New York City for a shopping spree and put a down payment on a $3.7 million dollar home in California and not get caught is puzzling.
What were they thinking? Of course, they have been charged with forgery, grand theft and grand theft by embezzlement and they each must post bail in the amount of $285,000, with the verification of funds.
According to the November 30th USAtoday.com article, “Report: Strippers pose as legal aides at detention center”, strippers, as well as South American pole dancers have been posing as paralegals so as to visit rich drug lords at the maximum Federal Detention Center in Miami.
I don’t know about you, but this kind of pi***s me off!! I’ve worked hard (and still do) to get where I am at in my Paralegal Career. When “women” do these things with the assistance of attorneys who should know better, it makes those of us in law who treasure what we do, look bad. Let’s face it, lawyers are the butt of many jokes and this act done by several attorneys in Miami doesn’t help the image. Yes, I am outraged, but really, working in law as long as I have, I am not really surprised.
No, I don’t know how she did it, sorry. I also don’t recommend hiding out after you are sentenced to jail time, heck, I don’t even recommend doing anything to get you that jail time in the first place! A New Orleans woman, 60 year old Linda Jean Doria, managed to elude arrest by continuing to work as a paralegal in two separate law firms in New Orleans for over 11 years.
Linda Doria
Ms. Doria was sentenced to 4 years in jail in 2000, when she was the single mother of a then 10 year old son. The judge gave her 30 days to get things in order and turn herself in to serve her time. She stated when arrested last month that she did not want her son to be raised in state custody so she decided not to turn herself and then quietly lived her life until last month when a police trooper knocked on her door with her arrest warrant.
Doria told the police trooper she was surprised that she got away with it for so long. Her son was grown and in college, she told the trooper. So she went willingly with him. On Aug. 8 she was sent to the Louisiana Transition Center for Women in Tallulah to serve her four years.
I have been reading the articles and comments on the recent case in which the rival lawyer Thomas Gooch accused Dmitry N. Feofanov of exploiting his assistant Daniella Atencia‘s assets to “draw the attention of the jury away from the relevant proceedings.” Seems Ms. Atencia is Mr. Feofanov’s wife and he is not happy with the opposing attorney’s comments and antics.
Dmitry Feofanov and Daniella Atencia
As a woman, the comments made by some are quite hurtful to Ms. Atencia. To think that a beautiful woman who happens to be a paralegal, should not assist her attorney in court, is simply ludicrous. Distracting to the jury? Really? How so? Simply because she has large breasts? There is no mention, in what I have read, that says that Ms. Atencia was wearing inappropriate clothing in the courtroom, in fact from the picture here, it looks as if she is professionally dressed. Does Mr. Gooch think that jurors are really going to be so distracted and enamored with Ms. Atencia’s large breasts that they will disregard the law and facts before them and issue a verdict in favor of Mr. Feofanov? I highly doubt it and I would think the jurors would be a bit upset with Mr. Gooch for thinking that they are so shallow and impressionable.
To make matters worse, Mr. Feofanov is getting requests for pictures of his wife’s cleavage.
As a paralegal, what do you think of the motion that Mr. Gooch has filed? I would be very interested to hear from my fellow paralegals, male and female on this one.
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