Do all lawyers make a lot?

What about an immigration lawyer?

Immigration law is one of the specialties with the lowest average incomes, but that doesn't mean that there aren't lawyers making a very good living from a successful immigration practice. There are also lawyers running pro-bono shopfront clinics for minimum wage illegals in West LA or South Houston who aren't earning much more than their clients.

Just to edit CJ's comment about lawyers in public service.....
In my county a prosecutor (Deputy DA I) starts at about $55k a year, and caps out at about $130k a year (Deputy DA III), and a Public Defender (Deputy PD I) starts out at about $62k a year, and caps out at $145k (Deputy PD III)

Richard

Like any private business, it depends on a lot of things.

What service is provided? How efficiently is it performed? How effective is the Marketing? How efficient are they at collecting? How efficient are they at controlling other Overhead costs?

Immigration lawyers could do well in many places, the services are important and worth money, but if you pick someplace where nobody needs them, or if you forget to ask the client to pay, or if you have too many people on staff, it can be a disaster. Also important is the Marketing issue; if no one knows you are in business, you're not.

Nope! lawyers that work in public service make a fair living but not extravagant (think about $50,000 per year and still having to pay back law school loans!).

There are a few types of immigration lawyers. Some are high payed, private lawyers and they get a great salary, those who work for INS or to publicly defend those involved in cases make the same as other public servants, not much.

Except in very large firms a first year attorney can expect a salary of $50,000 or less. Immigration is a specialized field, however with the current climate involving immigration one could probably make a very decent salary specializing in immigration.

Definitely not! I worked for a criminal defense attorney as a paralegal who was only making about 70,000 per year, and he was still having to pay back his college loans. It all depends on what type of lawyer you become.

Only corporate lawyers