Legal market reform — especially with respect to non-lawyer involvement — has generated a great deal of notice recently.
The ABA Journal published an article last week referencing a Stanford Law School study that noted a "Utah model of reform allowing nonlawyers to offer legal services could be “critical” to serving people who can’t afford them."
Texas A&M Law Professor Milan Markovic recently co-authored an article published in the PENN LAW REVIEW titled Deregulation and the Lawyers' Cartel, in which he offers a more skeptical comparative take.
The legal news outlet Law360 Pulse also spoke with Markovic about the topic. "One way in which the legal market differs from other markets is in the asymmetry of its information. It's very difficult for many customers to appreciate the value of legal services or even know if they need those services, so the legal market isn't really a competitive market, he explained," the Law360 Pulse article notes.
According to Markovic, "for legal markets to better serve the public, regulators must tailor solutions by segment....Deregulation alone is insufficient and may in fact exacerbate existing market failures."