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[pentazole]

Your need to fight a straw man betrays more about you than it does about me.  Why all the emo and name calling?  Simply because I might be saying something that doesn't accord with your own personal patent career fantasy isn't any justification to personally attack me.  

Simply visit the jobs forum or call a patent law recruiter and you will quickly find out that bar membership is a huge plus in the legal world.  

As a well established patent attorney, I honestly could care less if you were about to write something good about me.  I also have serious doubts as to all these unnamed 'friends' making $700,000 a year, that is unless you happen to be a paralegal for a top tier major U.S. law firm.

You replied after I deleted my comment, which I still mean but I didn't want to leave it out there.  I don't live in any fantasy, and I don't expect myself to make 500K to a million, but I do well enough.  You get on here, and make a post about how deluded all engineers and scientists are, when in fact patent law is well within their range of career choices, and they are more suited to it than lawyers who are not engineers and scientists.  You're the one being all emo, your original post is all about emo, it comes across as bitter and offensive.  So please spare me the attitude and post something constructive.

[polymeronthebrain]

(I posted this on another thread, but since I've been following this thread and it seems appropriate to its discussion, I'm posting it here as well.)

Here's my anecdotal 2 cents.  I have a MS in Applied Physics, and a BSEE (magna cum laude) for undergrad.  A few years in industry.  I live in the Bay Area.  I heard all this scuttlebutt about how patent attorneys make all this money.  So I bought PLI on ebay.  Studied for a few months.  And passed the exam.  I sent out about 30 or 40 resumes, did a few interviews and got several job offers.  

Frankly, I'm extremely disappointed in the salaries being offered.  I actually currently making  significantly more than each and every job offer.  People on the board chatter back and forth about patent attorney's starting off at $170,000 and then quickly bump up to far more.  And sure that might exist somewhere, but those firms never contacted me back after I sent them my resume.  I was told by others in the field that those firms are basically impossible to break into unless you have a JD from a top-20 law school.  Also, I was told that the salary average is skewed by the enormous amount those few on the top of the elite firms make.  

Furthermore, drafting patents would be less gratifying than the research I'm doing now.  I would have needed a stronger economic incentive to switch (which I didn't get).

As of now, I'm pretty sure most of this hype does not reflect the real job market in the Bay Area.  And if not here, then where?  

I'm glad I have the USPTO membership, its just another tool in my tool box though.  It might help me get promoted into management the company where I'm at now.  

Finally, I can't help but slightly wonder in the deepest little dark areas of my mind, could people with an economic incentive to sell patent bar prep materials being the ones posting accounts of these rather unreal salaries as the norm in the patent field?

Take everything I've said as the anecdotal experience of one engineer in the Bay Area.  

[MrSnuggles]

There is a large gap between patent attorneys and patent agents - at least at the starting levels.  In the intermediate levels, agents and attorneys may bill approximately the same (e.g., 200-250/hr) and see a similar paycheck.

It doesn't suprise me that you didn't see offers that astounded you.  Also, it doesn't suprise me that the big law firms that offer the 160-170k starting salaries didn't bother considering employing an agent.

It's very hard to skew the numbers in the AIPLA report.  I think there's just too many people that respond across the whole spectrum.  However, on these boards, the numbers may be misrepresented a bit as people tend to focus on the limits at the high and low ends.

Personally, in the midwest (around Minneapolis), I can tell you from personal experience that starting salaries for attorneys range from $90k to $145k, depending on the firm's size, your own background, education, etc.  The average is probably close to $105k.  There are really only 2-3 firms that start people as high as $130-145 (e.g., Dorsey, Fish).  After 3-5 years, attorney salaries rise to around $200k.  Agent salaries are usually much less, maybe starting around $50k and capping out around $150k.  I would have to check the numbers.

I work at a firm with approx 90 attorneys.  We have one agent.  We don't look to hire more agents, except those that are in law school and clerk for us and have coincidentally already passed the exam - but they are targeted as future attorneys.

[polymeronthebrain]

90-150 k.  Those numbers accord with my experience.  

Compare this to the guy who posted earlier in this thread that he personally knew several agents earning 700 k a year!  He's probably not being completely honest.  

I'm done with school.  So law school is 100% out of the question.  

[W Vojak]

Different people have different motivations.

I'm 50 years old.  I work for the US research division of a major international company.  BS/MS in CS.  25+ years of experience.

For the past 1.5 years I've been working in the area of IP.  Helping our engineers mine ideas, create strategies, and write disclosures.  I also develop IP workflow processes and perform viability and clearance searches.  I've taken classes from PRG and Landon.

Salary wise I'm in that 110-120 range. (depends on bonus).  

I am NOT a registered patent agent, but it is in my plans to become one.  I do not want to work for a law firm or even switch jobs.  But hopefully I can continue to make contacts within the legal/IP industry and perhaps when I'm 60, I can take my pension, and my 401K and my savings and retire.

At that point I would like to do part time over flow work, preferably in the area of searches, as a supplement to my retirement income.  If I don't do something like this, I'll probably have to work full time till I'm 67.5      So if I were to pick up 5-10 search/clearance jobs per month, at $250-$500 depending on complexity, I could create a nice supplement to my retirement income.  best of all, as an avid RV'er, I could even perform this service while on the road.  All you need is a internet connection an a subscription to micropatent and Nexus (or similar), plus google, freepatents, freshpatents and all the other endless list of resource sites.

No dreams of making $250K/yr as a independent agent.  No misconceptions that patent agent = big bucks.  But I do see it as one more item on my resume' (in case the bottom falls out of my current job) and as a path to early retirement.

W Vojak

[Wiscagent]

W Vojak -

About 5 years ago I was in a similar situation to yours.  Then I was fired, i.e.  laid off, let go, took early retirement, encouraged to explore other opportunities, sh*t canned ... .  Fortunately I was able to get a job as a search professional within a few months.

I encourage you to go ahead and take the exam soon.  Also, on your resume it may be a good idea to list one of your job responsibilities as “patent facilitator” or “patent liaison”.  That pretty well sums up what you are doing.  Good luck.

[Drew83]

Interesting post....

It's very easy to come up with these fantasy-like perceptions about careers.  I'd like to blame TV for the idealistic views of attorneys and doctors.  These fantasies arise when people hear other people talking about the big picture.  It's easy to like the big picture of things, but when you actually do the work yourself, it can be a whole different story.  I'm sure many people percieve the medical field as a glamorous and perfect job.  You don't consider all the bs doctors have to put up with and the insurance they have to pay to be able to practice.  Not to mention the training they go through just to become one.  

I thought engineering would be cool, until I actually worked in engineering.  I love the degree, but the type of work involved is pretty boring, at least in my experience.

One will come across positives and negatives in any profession they choose (unless maybe, they're entrepreneurs).  I guess you have to choose which profession has the most positives...