33 Ways to Make Money While Your Legal Career Is in Limbo

I was originally going to title this "75 ways to make money while delusionally hoping that your legal career will become something important." Alas, I got really bored at around suggestion No. 33.

So "33 Ways to Make Money While Your Legal Career is in Limbo" it is. If you're waiting on bar results, job applications, interviews, federal and state hiring freezes ... whatever it is, these may help.

Read 'em and weep. Seriously, let it out. You probably aren't the next Clarence Darrow (or Clarence Thomas for that matter).

1. Write a Blog. (Monetizing a blog with ads and affiliate marketing links should get you just enough money to pay for Brass Monkeys and cocavino while living with your parents.)
2. Work at Starbucks. (Too soon?)
3. Become a Bartender. (Seriously. Bartending school is like $100 and you may get free booze at work.)
4. Clerk for a firm that advertises on Craigslist. (Ugh!)
5. Doc review. (If you can find a gig.)
6. Teach LSAT classes. (Kaplan requires 95th percentile; everyone else requires 98 or 99th)
7. Personal trainer. (You have plenty of time on your hands. Get in shape now.)
8. Used car salesman. (My friends are used car salesmen. Dealerships hire anybody who has an open schedule.)
9. Become a notary public. (Yes, you have to take an exam. But it's nothing like the bar exam.)
10. Window washer. (Homeless people use newspapers. You have casebooks and a diploma.)
11. Dog walker. (Again, you have casebooks that you can't sell back. Dogs poop. Perfect fit.)
12. Street musician. (Dude next to my house plays a plastic flute and still gets paid.)
13. Lottery. (You're due after three years of law school.)
14. Website content monkey. (Check Craigslist -- lots of websites/lawyers will pay you barely more than minimum wage to write articles.)
15. eBay peddler. (Clear your clutter or find crap at thrift stores. Use smartphone to check eBay for its value.)
16. Jewelry maker. (Everybody knows six people who sell homemade crap on Etsy, but you're different!)
17. Goat farmer. (My coworker does this on the side, and makes the best damn goat cheese in NorCal.)
18. Big Headed Guy at Athletics Game. (Same coworker tried it.)
19. Craigslist labor. (There's always "move my crap" gigs on Craigslist.)
20. Uber or Lyft driver. (Hey, this is actually not a terrible idea!)
21. Clinical studies. (Test subjects get paid surprisingly well. We take no responsibility if you grow a third nipple, however.)
22. Ticket scalper. (Risk? Not as much as that $150,000 degree.)
23. Sell your plasma. (Not your TV -- your blood.)
24. Sell your eggs. (Not the food -- the reproductive/ovulating kind.)
25. Sell your sperm. (A law degree? BANK.)
26. Join the ranks of the paparazzi. (Stalking celebs is fine, as long as you always carry a camera.)
27. Professional blackjack player. (Best odds, but the house still wins.)
28. Rent a spare bedroom. (AirBnB only has a few horror stories.
29. Recycle/dumpster dive. (Especially if you're in -- or near -- a $0.05/can state.)
30. Click on a spam comment on a blog. ("My cousin makes $3,875 a second at home by...")
31. Become an Amazon Mechanical Turk. (This sounds like the spam "work from home," but it's backed by Amazon and sounds incredibly miserable.)
32. Pursue that startup idea. (Again, you're special. You're different.)
33. Be a babysitter. (Why isn't this higher on my list?)

Yes, we're aware that many of these ideas are terrible. Some of them (LSAT teacher, clinical test subject, Craigslist labor), I've done personally. Some of them (selling eggs), not so much. But like most things, sometimes you have to throw a lot of crap on the wall (or page) and see if anything sticks.

If you've got any better ideas, tweet us @FindLawLP.

Editor's Note, August 18, 2015: This post was first published in September 2014. It has since been updated.

Related Resources:

• Craigslist Ad Breaks Our Hearts; Advice for the Unemployed (FindLaw's Greedy Associates)
• Where is the Best Place for a Young Law Grad to Live? (FindLaw's Greedy Associates)
• Quarter-Life Crisis: Tips for the 'New Lost Generation' (FindLaw's Greedy Associates)
• 101 Things to Do With Your J.D., Besides Practice Law (FindLaw's Greedy Associates)