While legal employment failed to return to pre-pandemic levels in 2021, Bureau of Labor Statistics data show that the picture did improve throughout the year, finishing on a positive note in the fourth quarter despite the headwinds of the rapidly spreading omicron variant of Covid-19.

In the fourth quarter, legal employment climbed to its highest levels of 2021 (1.85 million), representing an increase of 67,000 jobs since Q1 and inching closer to the pre-pandemic employment levels of fourth-quarter 2019 (2.01 million). Increases in the employment ranks of lawyers, paralegals, and legal support workers fueled overall strong growth in the fourth quarter—the first quarter of the pandemic where all three of these groups gained employment in the same quarter.

Paralegals have regained ground the fastest, continuing a three-quarter ascent to 483,000 (up from Q3’s 458,000). At the same time, Q4 lawyer employment neared its 2021 high, set in Q1 (1.09 million versus 1.1 million, respectively), and legal support roles rebounded from 66,000 in Q3 to 73,000 in Q4.

The increases in overall legal employment levels were coupled with three consecutive quarterly declines in unemployment rates for men and women as well as overall, settling at Q4 rates of 0.56%, 1.6%, and 1.1%, respectively.

The unemployment rates for men in legal occupations were lower in the fourth quarter of 2021 than in pre-pandemic fourth-quarter 2019 (0.9%), but they were slightly higher for women (1.33% in Q4 2019).

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