The balance either go to work for the government or for private industry, often in jobs equivalent to that of in house counsel. The statistical comparison problem is repeated in country after country. Germany typically differentiates among private attorneys, state attorneys, judges and other judicial officials, and law professors. But again, only the private attorneys are used in comparative studies. The other problem is finding statistics.
Studies directly comparing lawyers in different countries are few and far between.
For example, just about every introductory text on the Soviet legal system listed the number of law students, lawyers, judges and so on, and pointed out that their numbers were controlled by the Soviet central planning authorities to ensure that they all had jobs. Many other countries, such as France, Saudi Arabia and South Africa, however, seem far from enthusiastic about counting heads. Saudi Arabia, in particular, seems to have gone out of its way to obfuscate its statistics. It is possible that these countries do not regard the number of lawyers as being a matter of much import. It is also possible that they would prefer not to let the rest of the world know how many lawyers they have.