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Leaving Private Practice: How Organizational Context, Time Pressures, And Structural Inflexibilities Shape Departures From Private Law Practice, Fiona M. Kay, Stacey Alarie, Jones Adjei

Indiana Journal of Global Legal Studies

Numerous studies document women's overrepresentation among those leaving the profession of law. Although research has documented high turnover among women lawyers, particularly from private practice, only a handful of studies have explored the factors precipitating the decision to leave. The main causal factors identified to date include difficulties associated with combining family life and law practice and problems of discrimination and blocked career advancement. In this paper, we analyze data from a longitudinal study of nearly 1,600 Canadian lawyers, surveyed across a twenty-year period. Using survival models to estimate the timing of transitions out of private practice, we examine factors …