With the ongoing coronavirus pandemic threatening to stall economic growth, virtually all industries in the U.S. are hit hard, even the legal industry.

Angela, who is about to graduate from a law school this summer, said that all five law firms that were in touch with her have recently told her that they were going to put hiring on hold for another three months due to the coronavirus outbreak. 

Her husband, a litigation lawyer, also saw his income dwindle, with courts closed and most cases in suspension. But though their source of income has been cut off, the liabilities remain. They still have to pay rent for their apartment, and for the law firm that her husband founded. "We have no choice but to rely on our savings," she said.

The escalation of coronavirus outbreak in the U.S. threatens to trigger a sharp pullback in hiring and result in a significant number of layoffs. A record 3.28 million workers filed for unemployment benefits for the week ending March 21, and the filing for claims was nearly five times the previous record high. 

While the shockwave was first felt by industries like aviation, retail and hospitality, white-collar workers in the legal industry, technology and other services sectors are now feeling the hit. According to a list compiled by Candor, a San Francisco-based company that helps tech workers negotiate salaries, based on crowd-sourced information found that there are at least 487 companies in the U.S. with some form of hiring freeze since the coronavirus outbreak.

Internships have also been heavily affected. Several second-year law school students who got summer internship offers for public defender positions saw their offers rescinded because the courts are expected to remain shut in the near future. So did the first-year law students with internship offers for clerkship.

Even employees at big law firms in the most lucrative corporate law businesses are not spared. According to an employee at a law firm headquartered in New York, since few companies are considering going for initial public offering or contemplating merger and acquisition deals, their caseload and billable hours have seen a sharp fall.

As company revenues take a slash, some are resorting to pay cut and paid vacation. General Motors recently announced that it would temporarily cut 20 percent of around 69,000 employees' salary to save cash but it pledges to make up for the lost pay in a lump-sum payment by March 2021. For those in the engineering and manufacturing sectors, employees that cannot work remotely will be placed on leave and get only 75 percent of their pay.

A slashed pay is still better than layoffs for most workers. Nearly half of Americans receive health insurance through their employers. The layoff would deprive them of healthcare benefits at a time when it is needed the most.

"People are going to get big checks. It is not their fault. What happened to them is not their fault," said Trump at a press conference when asked about the uninsured as layoffs become commonplace.

The two-trillion-dollar economic relief plan sighed by President Trump last week promises 1,200 U.S. dollars for those affected by the coronavirus, and an additional payment from the state agency for unemployment benefits.

The federal government has also allowed states to amend their law to expand the eligibility criteria for unemployment benefits, given the large number of people affected by the coronavirus outbreak. Independent contractors, freelancers and other self-employed people who normally don't qualify for unemployment benefits are also eligible to apply under the new rule. 

But a lack of clarity still persists. A few workers reported on Twitter that they were told by the state unemployment agency that their employment status was "zero hour schedule"  instead of "unemployed" and thus they were ineligible for unemployment benefits.

Amid the layoffs and slashed pay, a few industries are ramping up hiring. A Linkedin analysis of job posting data in the U.S. between March 15 and March 21 shows that companies with the most job openings in the U.S. are 7-Eleven, Army National Guard, KPMG, and Amazon among others. 

Since the decline in new job postings is an indicator of companies' lack of confidence in the business prospect, there is worry that the jobless situation in the U.S., on top of Americans reining in their spending, is going to lead to an economic recession.

Bank of America's top U.S. economist, Michelle Meyer, warned investors in a note on March 19 that "the economy has fallen into a recession," with a projection of GDP shrinking by 12 percent in the second quarter and by 0.8 percent for the full year.

"Legal services are non-essential businesses for corporations, and thus it is understandable that most companies cut their budget reserved for paying the law firms," said Angela while talking about the job market situation, adding "I have no choice but to wait until the pandemic ends."