Agreed material facts/background material: GO8 LLB(Hons)/BCOMM student here, going into 3rd year starting in Feb next year; part-time paralegal work for 1+ year counting now
Do I enjoy working in the law? Yes. I absolutely love it. I work supervised under special counsel for bigger matters and get to learn a lot about types of matters and how to run them (the way I learn is that he dictates, I make notes, draft the document(s). Later on I sort of get the hang of it on he just says "prepare a letter of demand to XYZ along the lines of this [matter name], and show me a draft by 3pm."
I also love having supervised carriage of smaller matters (which are relatively discreet and would otherwise cost too much for other solicitors to appear, my firm's rate which they set for me is $176/hour and everybody else is $300/hr+). At the end of the day, it's about advising the guy who had bleached poured on his front lawn by his neighbours, advising the 50-year-old teacher what the next steps are for her professional negligence claim, or helping tear a big corporation a new one (via "involuntary redundancy compensation") for bullying and harassment. It's absolutely brilliant getting to help real people in real claims, I love it.
What part sucks? D I S C O V E R Y. Although most i've done is 2,900 documents by myself, I am sure that there are matters with 50,000+ documents - I will wait for that day and it will not be welcome.
Do I like studying law? Most public law subjects are taught very poorly at my university. I have interest in jurisprudence/ethics etc, yet for the life of me, I cannot stand to actually study and get above a Credit in. Other 'sensible/logic' law subjects I enjoy and do well in (crim law, international law, torts, contracts), and lucky for me 3rd year onwards is mostly about them.
I wholeheartedly agree that universities really 'push' to be selling law. Most people would not like what they are getting into. I really wish there was a more 'practical' side of it which showed how the law actually applies in real-world matters, or at least they told us what working environments at law firms would be and how to manage the stress/work/life balance.
Regrettably, most of my friends want to enter 'commercial law'. When I ask them what they mean by that, they say 'er..Mergers and Acquisitions'. Nah mate, trust me, you don't want to be working weekends and 8+ hours billed days at Mallesons for the first 3 years and get burned out. I don't know though, each to their own.
Anyway, but what do I know. I'll report back in 5 years time to see if my views have changed (and they probably would have).