Even the lodestar base rate would have the lawyers paid more than Nobel prize winning scientists.  And certainly more than the government will pay a Nobel laureate to consult on what is something Congress wants. If the quality of the lawyer really matters so much more than the quality of the case, than our court system is indeed a mess.

Of course this assumes that the lawyer gets the amount awarded as "take home", which is probably far from the truth. In a big/tough civil rights case you are probably going to have firms litigating -- as opposed to just a single lawyer. Firm overhead is one reason lawyers cost so much, good secretaries, bookkeepers, and paralegals cost a lot of money (especially if you give 'em healthcare!). Then there is the office, etc. I'm not certain, in this case, how the court broke down "fees" versus "costs" or if it even did. Does the typical lodestar figure in expert fees? Academic research? Of course, on the converse a firm can certainly pad its hours to generate a higher return, which is easy to do if you're just looking at hours expended.

And it seems it also would have been interesting to question the Justice's seeming assumption of the traditional "billable hour" notion of compensation when that is under so much attack. Why pay lawers for how many hours they've logged and not for the 'quality' of their cases? It would have been interesting to hear the Justices answer "Just how much was Brown v. Board of Education worth?", or for someone to calculate how much the winning side paid in "Bush v. Gore".

Nobel Prize Winning scientists get a lump sum of $1.4 million, in addition to what are generally six figure salaries for multiple years. In addition, Alex Rodriguez, who plays a child's game for a living, makes a quarter-billion dollars over the course of his contract. Finally, Sam Walton's children each made tens of millions of dollars for the extremely difficult task of breathing until he died. Yes, our society's priorities are a bit weird, but I never fault someone who actually did something to get their money.

Yes, and Paul McCartney hes earned hundreds of millions for writing silly love songs. Wierd priorities, indeed.