The National Law Journal reviewed the 257 annual financial disclosures filed last year by federal appeals judges, which covered their off-the-bench earnings, investments and other financial activity in 2013. Here are some highlights from the reports.

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Earnings Off the Bench

Federal appeals judges reported earning more than $5.4 million in outside income in 2013. Roughly half of that money came from judges' retirement savings from their previous jobs, another $2.1 million was for law school teaching, and the rest, about $250,000, came from publishing royalties.

A few law schools shelled out big bucks for judges to teach. Active federal judges couldn't earn more than $26,955 in 2013 for teaching and other approved educational activities, but there is no such cap for senior judges.

Six senior judges reported teaching income of at least $100,000. Judge Douglas Ginsburg of the D.C Circuit earned the most, reporting $173,604 from George Mason University School of Law and $163,270 from New York University School of Law.

Ginsburg taught three classes at NYU in 2013, according to the law school. “In addition to enriching our curriculum, judges who teach here engage with students and contribute to the intellectual life of the law school in a way that is enormously valuable,” a law school spokesman said in an email to the NLJ.

At George Mason, Ginsburg taught three courses and helped establish the Global Antitrust Institute within the school's Law and Economics Center, according to law school professor and former dean Daniel Polsby. “We kept him quite busy. And he's gotten busier since,” Polsby said. “We're quite delighted with the arrangement.”

Ginsburg did not return a request for comment.

Third Circuit Judge Anthony Scirica joined the senior judge top earners group in 2013. Scirica took senior status in July 2013. Over the second half of the year he reported earning $75,000 for teaching at the University of Pennsylvania Law School. He's taught at Penn since 1997.

“I love teaching. It's exciting, the students are terrific and the faculty at Penn has been welcoming,” Scirica said. When he took senior status in 2013, “I was 72 at the time and I thought, I'd like to teach more and I'm in a position where I can do that.”

Scirica said he hasn't reduced his workload on the bench much since becoming a senior judge. “My friends tell me I'm going in the wrong direction in terms of workload, but it's what I like,” he said.