According to a widely circulated list of hiring chairs at different law schools in the U.S., 117 have already named appointments chairs, compared to 138 last year.  That's not as big a drop-off as I had feared we might see.  Bear in mind that last year's 138 hiring chairs yielded 88 rookie hires at 66 law schools according to Professor Lawsky's data (of course, some schools hired laterals, not rookies).   Still, while this will definitely be a tighter job market, it may be somewhat better than many had feared.