Up front, I must say, I have a bias against gambling. It was my father’s unceasing love of Off Track Betting that caused my parents’ divorce. And Las Vegas just isn’t my bag.

So, would you take this bet?

You’ve completed your undergraduate degree. If you attended a state school, you may have no debt at all. An Ivy League school — perhaps you already owe twenty or thirty thousand dollars. You’re looking around a entry-level jobs. You’re finding that they’re basically the same ’secretarial’ jobs that were offered in the 1960’s, but now the title’s been elevated to ‘assistant.’ Sure it’s a demeaning job that won’t use your hard earned skills, your soon to be Alma mater’s career center tells you, but it’s the stepping stone to a career. Plus, you find, the job pays $20,000 per year if you’re lucky.

Quickly, you do the calculations in your recently educated head. At that rate, if you live in one of the cities offering these lucrative jobs, that small college debt won’t be paid off so quickly. Gone are your dreams of a new car, great apartment, cool clothes, and fun nights clubbing your way through your twenties. Who knew adulthood was going to be so hard.

Enter law school — a new solution. Now you’re looking around at graduate programs. Hmm, business school applications opine that you should have some business training under your belt — umm, back to dilemma #1, with that $20,000 a year job looming. Graduate school in your liberal arts major of underwater basket-weaving seems that it will lead you to a path of teaching underwater basket-weaving in a town similar to the one that was cool for college, but not for living.

Ah, law school, the savior. Looking at those statistics in U.S. News seem promising. Private salaries for starting attorneys are over $100,000. And you’ll have an assistant, rather than being the assistant.

But upon further investigation, things may not be so rosy. Unless your parents have won the lottery, they’re tapped out after sending you to that pricey college. Law school tuition (and room and board, because you’re not quite ready for homelessness), hovers between $50,000 and $55,000 per year. And those great salaries — are reserved for a precious few — top law school graduates — top schools, top grades, and definitely non-minority, maybe 10 percent of law school graduates. Reading boards like Infirmation, you discover that if you don’t get one of these top paying jobs — you’re options quickly dwindle to government work $36,000 — $50,000, public interest work, $30,000 - $40,000, being an ‘ambulance chaser’ for $30,000 - $50,000 — the world for the other 90 percent.

So, with three years of your life gone, and a potential $100,000 - $140,000 in debt hanging over your head (we’re talking about 10 years of $1500 monthly payments — or 30 years of $400 monthly payments — do you take the gamble?

Before you answer, remember that you have little control over whether you’ll end up in that elite 10 percent. You’ll have less control over whether you can stay in that elite group — where you’re one economic downturn from lay off. That’s the chance you take. The debt, however, is certain.

You may have a better chance of winning the lottery.