Its very expensive to become an attorney from all the initial education (aka, repaying student loans). Add on to that the malpractice insurance, the licensing fees (fee for test + new license + maintain license), the continuing education costs, fees related to document discovery (ever try going through 200k documents by yourself?), the researching fees (lexis/west law/bloomberg), the filing fees to submit filings to the court/regulating body, the fees to access the docketing portals, and the costs related to hiring employees to help (the secretary, the paralegal, the receptionist, etc), and the regular office supplies (paper, electricity, rent, binders, etc.), then it starts to make sense why attorneys fees add up.