Will AI Replace Lawyers?

Automation in law is not new. In 2012, in Da Silva Moore v. Publicis Groupe, a federal magistrate judge in New York approved the use of predictive coding in discovery. Since then, technology-assisted review has reduced the manual document review that once employed many junior lawyers. Generative AI extends automation to drafting, summarizing and research. Estimates of the scale vary. A 2023 Goldman Sachs report estimated that about 44 percent of legal work tasks could be exposed to AI automation. An earlier study by Dana Remus and Frank Levy, using pre-generative technology, estimated that only about 13 percent of lawyer time could be automated. Exposure is not the same as replacement. Tasks within a job can be automated while the job itself changes. Lower costs can also increase demand for legal work. Major firms and vendors have invested heavily. Allen & Overy (now A&O Shearman) announced a deployment of Harvey in 2023, and Thomson Reuters acquired Casetext, maker of CoCounsel, for $650 million the same year. Some work now requires fewer hours, and new roles are growing: legal engineers, knowledge management lawyers, legal operations staff, AI governance specialists and e-discovery experts. The evidence on hiring is still limited. Associate hiring depends on deal flow, litigation volume and the wider economy, and it is too early to separate AI's effect from those factors. Two pressures are clear. Under the billable hour, faster work means less revenue per task, which encourages flat and alternative fees. And junior lawyers have traditionally learned through routine work that AI now performs, so firms need new ways to train them. Unmet need is large. The Legal Services Corporation's 2022 Justice Gap report found that low-income Americans received no legal help, or not enough, for 92 percent of their civil legal problems. Cheaper legal work could expand access rather than simply shrink the profession.