ABA Survey (2,915 Attorneys): Women Lawyers Face 14-Point Anxiety Gap — Billable Hour Is the Primary Structural Driver

The ABA's new survey of 2,915 attorneys — one of the largest-sample mental health studies of the profession — found that 37% of women lawyers report experiencing anxiety, compared with 23% of men, a 14-point gap that holds across multiple wellbeing dimensions. Among women lawyers, 19% reported depressive symptoms warranting clinical evaluation (versus 15% of men); 40% reported financial strain (versus under 30% of men); 36% reported mental wellness issues (versus 26% of men); and 31% reported poor sleep (versus under 19% of men). Women lawyers primarily attributed their stress to billable hour requirements, workplace structures, gender bias, and work-life conflicts. Critically, women lawyers rarely utilise available mental wellness resources due to concerns about confidentiality, stigma, and professional risk — meaning the self-reported figures almost certainly understate the clinical population. For law firm HR directors and wellbeing officers, the survey's recommended actions are structural, not programmatic: reform lawyer workloads, review the billable hour model, provide routine education on gender-specific stressors, and offer genuinely confidential mental health resources whose confidentiality is not undermined by firm processes that could create reputational risk for attorneys who use them.