The economy is dreadful but I imagine that some sectors are still recruiting...do you have any idea which ones and what subjects are the best bets this year to get a job in the US and elsewhere after the LLM?
Banking seems to be the worst one but at the same time new regulations will be enacted and this will need up-to-date lawyers...
Same thing with environmental law...
Bankruptcy law and restructuring...
Do you agree. Any other ideas?

what are the sectors that you are thinking of?

what are the sectors that you are thinking of?

idem, the only sector i can think of right now is environment, climate change law, green tech etc.
i believe it's one of the few sectors that is/won't be much affected by the current crisis and also a sector that will get pretty big in the next years...

apart from this... no idea...

Does anybody have an idea whether environment lawyers are currently in demand? Is it a very international discipline or does it have mainly to do with national regulations?

it depends i guess. many regulations are national or regional (eg European Union), but you can probably have a more international approach of the question if you focus on carbon credit trading (EU ETS, Kyoto, or even in the US the Regional greenhouse gas initiative) or project finance complying with Kyoto protocol etc.
I think the demand for environment lawyers is going to grow, because companies will have to take environmental issues into account more and more.. I would also assume that the fact that many universities offer now degrees in env. law is a sign that the demand will be high in the coming years

well, those are just my thoughts, of course.. any other idea, anyone?

I am in a similar situation. I am applying to two very different programs, Environmental at VLS and Banking and Finance at BU. I see these two areas expanding a lot because of the current government and popular demand for regulation in both fields. I am not sure which is more useful and am curious about what people think will be more in demand in the near future.

La mort des personnes physiques et morales, c'est une valeur sure en droit. Faillites, testaments, successions, viagers, un secteur tres porteur surtout en période de crise où le nombre de suicides augmente!

Plus sérieusement...

Right now, true "environnement lawyers" are only in demand in government services, to counsel and draft new policies.

In the private sector, 99% of the actual environment work is done by tax lawyers (CO2 quotas, etc) and by insurance lawyers (management of the environmantal risk).
"environment law" is the conjunction of various fields of law, but it's not an actual field of law. Major companies have created environment departments and in it you find several lawyers specialized in traditional fields of law, and all together they become "the environment law team" but none of them actually is an "environment lawyer".

In law school, when you study "environment law", what you actually study is international treaties (so the usual public international law rules apply) and regional/national policies such as European commission regulations (hence the usual European union law apply).

Now it may change, I don't know, perhaps "environment lawyer" is going to become a category all by itself.
For now, I think a tax, or IP, corporate, or business law LLM with a couple of environment law courses and research papers focused on environment issues should be reasonable bets: you'd still be general enough to interest recruiters who aren't looking for an environment lawyer, and it should give you enough "environment taint" to get a position in the environment department of a company or law firm.

Hedek,

I respectfully disagree almost completely. Perhaps it's different abroad, and your remarks may have been directed to that. But in the USA "environmental law" is most definitely a specialized area of practice that is different from tax, corporate or insurance. I myself am an "environmental lawyer" at a large law firm in the midwestern USA. My firm has an entire "environmental law department" and many other firms do as well. I also disagree that environmental lawyers are only in demand in government. Not so, in my experience - I've been doing this in private practice for 5 years now.

As for the rest of the thread, from my perspective anyway, I agree that environmental and energy law is a definite growth area going forward.

Hedek,

I respectfully disagree almost completely. Perhaps it's different abroad, and your remarks may have been directed to that. But in the USA "environmental law" is most definitely a specialized area of practice that is different from tax, corporate or insurance. I myself am an "environmental lawyer" at a large law firm in the midwestern USA. My firm has an entire "environmental law department" and many other firms do as well. I also disagree that environmental lawyers are only in demand in government. Not so, in my experience - I've been doing this in private practice for 5 years now.

As for the rest of the thread, from my perspective anyway, I agree that environmental and energy law is a definite growth area going forward.

Hedek,

I respectfully disagree almost completely. Perhaps it's different abroad, and your remarks may have been directed to that. But in the USA "environmental law" is most definitely a specialized area of practice that is different from tax, corporate or insurance. I myself am an "environmental lawyer" at a large law firm in the midwestern USA. My firm has an entire "environmental law department" and many other firms do as well. I also disagree that environmental lawyers are only in demand in government. Not so, in my experience - I've been doing this in private practice for 5 years now.

Thank you very much. Indeed, practice seems to be quite different, which reassures me even more in my decision to do an LLM in the US: I clearly have a lot to learn about the American legal system.

I guess the market is evolving more rapidly than I thought, and firms are already recruiting specialized lawyers whereas before they sort of hired lawyers from other fields and had them specialize in-house.

Out of curiosity, which year did you graduate in, and were your studies specialized in environmental law? If not, how did you come to work in this field?

Thanks again for sharing your experience.

or maybe the ultimate bet is to bet on something nobody will bet on, ie banking law !