NY to 200k?! Forum

[Anonymous User]

Any guesses to how long lit-only firms (Quinn, boutiques etc.) will take to match? I know corp is driving the raises, but I could see an exodus of lit associates to equally "prestigious," equally sweatshoppy full service firms that will pay more because they have a busy corporate department if there isn't a match.

After all is said and done and the new scale stabilizes, elite boutiques to 220k - 230k?? Meaning those who advertise an "above market" base tied to the old Cravath/Milbank 190k scale

[Anonymous User]

The pay for all slaves will be raised in due course. Just a matter of when.

Someone always takes "BigLaw associates don't get paid enough" a little too far.

Honestly, he didn't take it far enough. The junior most biglaw associate's income puts them at a mere 96 percentile of U.S. income earners. Can you imagine how oppressive life is to labor under the sweltering heat of knowing that 4% of U.S. income earners make more than you?

Well, we're all (or most?) trying to figure out just how feel about the fact that biglaw associates are treated like inanimate cogs and effectively prohibited from living a life a typical person would consider normal in terms of family and friends and social life, which is true, but also paid a meaningful fraction of a million dollars a year, way above a typical earner, which is also true. All of these things can be true at the same time.

[Anonymous User]

The pay for all slaves will be raised in due course. Just a matter of when.

Someone always takes "BigLaw associates don't get paid enough" a little too far.

Honestly, he didn't take it far enough. The junior most biglaw associate's income puts them at a mere 96 percentile of U.S. income earners. Can you imagine how oppressive life is to labor under the sweltering heat of knowing that 4% of U.S. income earners make more than you?

Well, we're all (or most?) trying to figure out just how feel about the fact that biglaw associates are treated like inanimate cogs and effectively prohibited from living a life a typical person would consider normal in terms of family and friends and social life, which is true, but also paid a meaningful fraction of a million dollars a year, way above a typical earner, which is also true. All of these things can be true at the same time.

Yep, and we're also arguably under-paid relative to what the firms are bringing in for our time - at least at some firms. Biglaw associates have some very legitimate gripes. People just run into trouble when they start comparing them to enslavement, or even other "laborer vs. capitalist" situations, since we're all paid so much better than your average person.

[Anonymous User]

The pay for all slaves will be raised in due course. Just a matter of when.

Someone always takes "BigLaw associates don't get paid enough" a little too far.

Honestly, he didn't take it far enough. The junior most biglaw associate's income puts them at a mere 96 percentile of U.S. income earners. Can you imagine how oppressive life is to labor under the sweltering heat of knowing that 4% of U.S. income earners make more than you?

Well, we're all (or most?) trying to figure out just how feel about the fact that biglaw associates are treated like inanimate cogs and effectively prohibited from living a life a typical person would consider normal in terms of family and friends and social life, which is true, but also paid a meaningful fraction of a million dollars a year, way above a typical earner, which is also true. All of these things can be true at the same time.

Who cares how much random people make. I care about what partners make, which is 2-3x more than they were making 15 years ago. Yet associate salaries essentially stayed the same over the last 15 years. Associates are definitely underpaid compared to all the extra $$$ we’ve been making for partners.

[Anonymous User]

A few comments after reading through this disaster of a thread:

* The guy a few pages back who noted that this represents only an ~10% increase in inflation-adjusted terms vs. what associates were making in ~2005 as compared with an ~250% increase in partner profit for whatever firm he was referencing had the right idea; as a fraction of partner profits, associates are getting increasingly shafted and the business model is fundamentally changing in that most associates just aren't viewed as future members of the partnership but rather as transient workers so why share the wealth from an early stage. But ....

* Also keep in mind that partner profitability doesn't exist in a vacuum. Firms are constantly competing for lateral books of business. If Skadden decided to just start first years at 300k and make a scale accordingly--something on paper they could easily afford to do--you'd get partner defections / poaching en masse. That's the insidious nature of how the industry operates: by keeping associate salaries set to an industry-wide scale that is raised incrementally every so often even in the face of gargantuan profit growth, they've been able to decouple associate compensation from partner profitability without causing an uproar amongst incoming associates because "where else are you going to go?" (Someone hinted at this point early on in the discussion where he raised the point that actually having differentiated compensation structures across the V50 would be a nightmare for most firms and is one of the reasons you've never seen Skadden or KE or Latham just break away from everyone--no one wants this, even the ones who would supposedly benefit from it.)

* The only time when the above dynamic changes is when there is significant lateral movement out of law to some other industry which in turn puts actual pressure on firms to compensate. The last time that happened was in the dot com era when attorneys were going into tech. There's arguably a smaller version of that going on right now (hence the rounds of oddly timed bonuses and now a scale increase) where the "other industry" in this case is simply leaving the law entirely because people are burned out from COVID + workload. In other words, what's happened these past 6-12 months seems to be driven by attrition concerns at a scale not seen maybe ever in industry history.

* Last, small point: Everyone needs to stop hoping that Kirkland of all firms is going to come in and upset the scale. I do suspect we'll see the market scale land slightly higher, 205 or 210, but it sure as hell isn't going to be because of Kirkland. They've made their MO clear over the past twelve months and that's to be conservative whenever a comp war breaks out and just wait until the end to match. KE seems content to break market with year end bonuses and lateral recruiting but doesn't get into the mix for associate comp. wars.

Thanks for listening to my newsletter.

[TigerIsBack]

A few comments after reading through this disaster of a thread:

* The guy a few pages back who noted that this represents only an ~10% increase in inflation-adjusted terms vs. what associates were making in ~2005 as compared with an ~250% increase in partner profit for whatever firm he was referencing had the right idea; as a fraction of partner profits, associates are getting increasingly shafted and the business model is fundamentally changing in that most associates just aren't viewed as future members of the partnership but rather as transient workers so why share the wealth from an early stage. But ....

* Also keep in mind that partner profitability doesn't exist in a vacuum. Firms are constantly competing for lateral books of business. If Skadden decided to just start first years at 300k and make a scale accordingly--something on paper they could easily afford to do--you'd get partner defections / poaching en masse. That's the insidious nature of how the industry operates: by keeping associate salaries set to an industry-wide scale that is raised incrementally every so often even in the face of gargantuan profit growth, they've been able to decouple associate compensation from partner profitability without causing an uproar amongst incoming associates because "where else are you going to go?" (Someone hinted at this point early on in the discussion where he raised the point that actually having differentiated compensation structures across the V50 would be a nightmare for most firms and is one of the reasons you've never seen Skadden or KE or Latham just break away from everyone--no one wants this, even the ones who would supposedly benefit from it.)

* The only time when the above dynamic changes is when there is significant lateral movement out of law to some other industry which in turn puts actual pressure on firms to compensate. The last time that happened was in the dot com era when attorneys were going into tech. There's arguably a smaller version of that going on right now (hence the rounds of oddly timed bonuses and now a scale increase) where the "other industry" in this case is simply leaving the law entirely because people are burned out from COVID + workload. In other words, what's happened these past 6-12 months seems to be driven by attrition concerns at a scale not seen maybe ever in industry history.

* Last, small point: Everyone needs to stop hoping that Kirkland of all firms is going to come in and upset the scale. I do suspect we'll see the market scale land slightly higher, 205 or 210, but it sure as hell isn't going to be because of Kirkland. They've made their MO clear over the past twelve months and that's to be conservative whenever a comp war breaks out and just wait until the end to match. KE seems content to break market with year end bonuses and lateral recruiting but doesn't get into the mix for associate comp. wars.

Thanks for listening to my newsletter.

^ Like

[Anonymous User]

A few comments after reading through this disaster of a thread:

* The guy a few pages back who noted that this represents only an ~10% increase in inflation-adjusted terms vs. what associates were making in ~2005 as compared with an ~250% increase in partner profit for whatever firm he was referencing had the right idea; as a fraction of partner profits, associates are getting increasingly shafted and the business model is fundamentally changing in that most associates just aren't viewed as future members of the partnership but rather as transient workers so why share the wealth from an early stage. But ....

* Also keep in mind that partner profitability doesn't exist in a vacuum. Firms are constantly competing for lateral books of business. If Skadden decided to just start first years at 300k and make a scale accordingly--something on paper they could easily afford to do--you'd get partner defections / poaching en masse. That's the insidious nature of how the industry operates: by keeping associate salaries set to an industry-wide scale that is raised incrementally every so often even in the face of gargantuan profit growth, they've been able to decouple associate compensation from partner profitability without causing an uproar amongst incoming associates because "where else are you going to go?" (Someone hinted at this point early on in the discussion where he raised the point that actually having differentiated compensation structures across the V50 would be a nightmare for most firms and is one of the reasons you've never seen Skadden or KE or Latham just break away from everyone--no one wants this, even the ones who would supposedly benefit from it.)

* The only time when the above dynamic changes is when there is significant lateral movement out of law to some other industry which in turn puts actual pressure on firms to compensate. The last time that happened was in the dot com era when attorneys were going into tech. There's arguably a smaller version of that going on right now (hence the rounds of oddly timed bonuses and now a scale increase) where the "other industry" in this case is simply leaving the law entirely because people are burned out from COVID + workload. In other words, what's happened these past 6-12 months seems to be driven by attrition concerns at a scale not seen maybe ever in industry history.

* Last, small point: Everyone needs to stop hoping that Kirkland of all firms is going to come in and upset the scale. I do suspect we'll see the market scale land slightly higher, 205 or 210, but it sure as hell isn't going to be because of Kirkland. They've made their MO clear over the past twelve months and that's to be conservative whenever a comp war breaks out and just wait until the end to match. KE seems content to break market with year end bonuses and lateral recruiting but doesn't get into the mix for associate comp. wars.

Thanks for listening to my newsletter.

Good stuff. Can you elaborate more on your second point about why differentiated comp. structures across the V50 would be a nightmare for firms?

[Anonymous User]

When people complain about outrageous partner profitability, as compared with associate compensation, really they refer to the top echelon of firms (V20?) Which leads us to the deeper problem: lawyers are driven more by status than wealth. This thread is a perfect example. A number of people are more interested in hand-wringing about which firms are prestigious than discussing the topic of compensation.

En masse that means that firms like DPW, CSM or S&C don't need to make substantial pay raises. They'll still attract the cream of the crop. This is even more startling when viewed in other markets, such as in London where magic circle firms underpay their staff and still hire many of the top OxBridge graduates. Or Australia where the government recently made a ruling because Biglaw graduates were being paid lower than minimum wage when taking overtime into account. No wonder CSM partners can fearlessly make comments to associates like "You're already overpaid" even in the current market.

People also calculate their odds of making partner based on their associate cohort. But that figure is heavily impacted by survivorship bias. It takes no account of the countless bodies accumulated by the wayside over the years outside their sight of vision.

I recently took a prestige 'hit' in a lateral move. I am still paid the same salary and bonus scale. However I work remotely in a low cost of living, no tax state (which means I am effectively paid 10% more than before) with clients that hardly work on weekends. I am still on track to bill 2000+ hours, but on my own timetable and without the constant looming fear of impromptu teleconferences at 1pm on Saturday when out and about. Despite my life improving and pay-packet increasing, however, people still constantly ask me if I was pushed out etc. Until there is a cultural shift, even to the point that graduates begin to eschew those V10 sweatshops, the firms will always have the upper hand and ability to dictate compensation and working conditions more generally.

[Anonymous User]

I think that the way that WFH arrangements shake out could have a lasting effect on Biglaw comp going forward.

If perma-WFH in-house roles exist going forward a Biglaw associate in NYC/Cali could take the in-house role and move to a low CoL city and not really even feel the cut in compensation while getting a huge QoL boost from working less hours.

I know I would drop Biglaw in a heartbeat if I could make 150k+/yr in any location I wanted working 45-55hrs a week. Would be the easiest decision of my life, and Biglaw comp would have to increase drastically to make me rethink the decision.

[jarofsoup]

The pay for all slaves will be raised in due course. Just a matter of when.

Someone always takes "BigLaw associates don't get paid enough" a little too far.

Honestly, he didn't take it far enough. The junior most biglaw associate's income puts them at a mere 96 percentile of U.S. income earners. Can you imagine how oppressive life is to labor under the sweltering heat of knowing that 4% of U.S. income earners make more than you?

I think you are spinning this the wrong way. We are paid a lot to not have lives. Almost to the point where the money is a complete abstraction.

[thisismytlsuername]

A few comments after reading through this disaster of a thread:

...

* Also keep in mind that partner profitability doesn't exist in a vacuum. Firms are constantly competing for lateral books of business. If Skadden decided to just start first years at 300k and make a scale accordingly--something on paper they could easily afford to do--you'd get partner defections / poaching en masse. That's the insidious nature of how the industry operates: by keeping associate salaries set to an industry-wide scale that is raised incrementally every so often even in the face of gargantuan profit growth, they've been able to decouple associate compensation from partner profitability without causing an uproar amongst incoming associates because "where else are you going to go?" (Someone hinted at this point early on in the discussion where he raised the point that actually having differentiated compensation structures across the V50 would be a nightmare for most firms and is one of the reasons you've never seen Skadden or KE or Latham just break away from everyone--no one wants this, even the ones who would supposedly benefit from it.)

Good stuff. Can you elaborate more on your second point about why differentiated comp. structures across the V50 would be a nightmare for firms?

Not OP, but I think his/her general point is that partners are, above all else, greedy assholes who care about nothing more than how much money they're making (as is evidenced by the many recent defections from say, Cravath, to firms that don't pay lockstep at partner levels, as well as the firms that have abandoned or modified their lockstep comp).

Let's say Skadden decides to differentiate themselves and double associate salaries. They can easily afford it, but their high-but-not-highest PPP would take a decent hit. There's a risk that partners with portable books who got a fairly big paycut due to this decision would just take their book and go elsewhere where they'd get paid more. Their gardeners at their Hamptons houses aren't paying for themselves.

[Anonymous User]

A few comments after reading through this disaster of a thread:

* The guy a few pages back who noted that this represents only an ~10% increase in inflation-adjusted terms vs. what associates were making in ~2005 as compared with an ~250% increase in partner profit for whatever firm he was referencing had the right idea; as a fraction of partner profits, associates are getting increasingly shafted and the business model is fundamentally changing in that most associates just aren't viewed as future members of the partnership but rather as transient workers so why share the wealth from an early stage. But ....

* Also keep in mind that partner profitability doesn't exist in a vacuum. Firms are constantly competing for lateral books of business. If Skadden decided to just start first years at 300k and make a scale accordingly--something on paper they could easily afford to do--you'd get partner defections / poaching en masse. That's the insidious nature of how the industry operates: by keeping associate salaries set to an industry-wide scale that is raised incrementally every so often even in the face of gargantuan profit growth, they've been able to decouple associate compensation from partner profitability without causing an uproar amongst incoming associates because "where else are you going to go?" (Someone hinted at this point early on in the discussion where he raised the point that actually having differentiated compensation structures across the V50 would be a nightmare for most firms and is one of the reasons you've never seen Skadden or KE or Latham just break away from everyone--no one wants this, even the ones who would supposedly benefit from it.)

* The only time when the above dynamic changes is when there is significant lateral movement out of law to some other industry which in turn puts actual pressure on firms to compensate. The last time that happened was in the dot com era when attorneys were going into tech. There's arguably a smaller version of that going on right now (hence the rounds of oddly timed bonuses and now a scale increase) where the "other industry" in this case is simply leaving the law entirely because people are burned out from COVID + workload. In other words, what's happened these past 6-12 months seems to be driven by attrition concerns at a scale not seen maybe ever in industry history.

* Last, small point: Everyone needs to stop hoping that Kirkland of all firms is going to come in and upset the scale. I do suspect we'll see the market scale land slightly higher, 205 or 210, but it sure as hell isn't going to be because of Kirkland. They've made their MO clear over the past twelve months and that's to be conservative whenever a comp war breaks out and just wait until the end to match. KE seems content to break market with year end bonuses and lateral recruiting but doesn't get into the mix for associate comp. wars.

Thanks for listening to my newsletter.

Good stuff. Can you elaborate more on your second point about why differentiated comp. structures across the V50 would be a nightmare for firms?

Because it would draw away profits from the partnerships without actually giving them a great boost in terms of quality of work product / productivity / outcomes (corollary: and they wouldn't be able to pass it onto clients for the same reason). There isn't some "super associate" cohort out there in the sense of boosting the firm's bottom line that could be scooped up if Skadden suddenly started offering a double scale or more generally there were wide differentiation across the industry in comp. If the model moved toward "paying what we're able to as a share of our huge profits" it would be all to the associates' benefit. So every law firm in biglaw is incentivized to engage in this tacit compensation coordination to make sure that never happens. The firms use perceptions of "prestige" + compensation coordination to keep associate pay constrained and direct profits into the partnerships. The day it becomes a race to see who can compensate the best among associates and the market fractures, all that goes away. So it will never happen.

[Anonymous User]

What do we think the odds of someone (presumably S&C, CSM or STB) topping the DPW scale? I work at one one of the three aforementioned firms and associate retention in corporate has been ATROCIOUS (there are basically no mid levels left in New York) so I wouldn’t necessarily be shocked if there was maybe another 5-10k/year of movement left.

The longer they wait/the more firms that match = less likelihood. If any of the aforementioned firms are planning on raising, they would likely do it Monday, or Tuesday at the latest

[Anonymous User]

Is there any other industry that manages to coordinate such a precise shared pricing scheme across dozens of major employers to avoid price competition, without ever actually meeting and committing an antitrust violation?

The whole Cravath Scale structure is extremely sketchy looking from the outside looking in, but maybe it's just because I'm not familiar with other industries.

[Anonymous User]

What do we think the odds of someone (presumably S&C, CSM or STB) topping the DPW scale? I work at one one of the three aforementioned firms and associate retention in corporate has been ATROCIOUS (there are basically no mid levels left in New York) so I wouldn’t necessarily be shocked if there was maybe another 5-10k/year of movement left.

The longer they wait/the more firms that match = less likelihood. If any of the aforementioned firms are planning on raising, they would likely do it Monday, or Tuesday at the latest

Interesting, why is that? If you’re going to come over the top, isn’t there a certain allure to taking your sweet time, letting all your peers match old market, and only then announcing the new market?

[Anonymous User]

Is there any other industry that manages to coordinate such a precise shared pricing scheme across dozens of major employers to avoid price competition, without ever actually meeting and committing an antitrust violation?

The whole Cravath Scale structure is extremely sketchy looking from the outside looking in, but maybe it's just because I'm not familiar with other industries.

Big accounting, consulting, and ibanking all have relatively standardized salaries. Bonuses are a factor of firm and dept profitability.

[Anonymous User]

Any guesses to how long lit-only firms (Quinn, boutiques etc.) will take to match? I know corp is driving the raises, but I could see an exodus of lit associates to equally "prestigious," equally sweatshoppy full service firms that will pay more because they have a busy corporate department if there isn't a match.

Any minute now. Kindof surprised Hueston Hennigan didn't announce on Friday - boutiques like that have an essentially automatic policy of matching market.

[Anonymous User]

The pay for all slaves will be raised in due course. Just a matter of when.

Someone always takes "BigLaw associates don't get paid enough" a little too far.

Honestly, he didn't take it far enough. The junior most biglaw associate's income puts them at a mere 96 percentile of U.S. income earners. Can you imagine how oppressive life is to labor under the sweltering heat of knowing that 4% of U.S. income earners make more than you?

I think you are spinning this the wrong way. We are paid a lot to not have lives. Almost to the point where the money is a complete abstraction.

Very well put.

[Yardbird]

One thing I’ve noticed is that Milbank’s raise this year is the same as in 2018. 10k each for 1-3 and 15k for the rest. They also said at the time that 2-3 years is an appropriate time to revisit salaries. I wonder if a similar 2023/2024 raise will happen.

[Hstrat]

The pay for all slaves will be raised in due course. Just a matter of when.

Someone always takes "BigLaw associates don't get paid enough" a little too far.

Honestly, he didn't take it far enough. The junior most biglaw associate's income puts them at a mere 96 percentile of U.S. income earners. Can you imagine how oppressive life is to labor under the sweltering heat of knowing that 4% of U.S. income earners make more than you?

I think you are spinning this the wrong way. We are paid a lot to not have lives. Almost to the point where the money is a complete abstraction.

That's a fair point as far as it goes. But there's still that whole "involuntary servitude" part of slavery that seems like an important difference.

[Sackboy]

Not every firm is a sweatshop. Like some other OP said, if you're in the right practice, at the right firm, and have some decent discipline, you can bill 2000-2200 and very much have a robust life, including little-to-no weekend work.

[Anonymous User]

Not every firm is a sweatshop. Like some other OP said, if you're in the right practice, at the right firm, and have some decent discipline, you can bill 2000-2200 and very much have a robust life, including little-to-no weekend work.

What practice group offers this

[Anonymous User]

Not every firm is a sweatshop. Like some other OP said, if you're in the right practice, at the right firm, and have some decent discipline, you can bill 2000-2200 and very much have a robust life, including little-to-no weekend work.

What practice group offers this

I’m in a comp/benefits practice at a market paying firm, and I usually get my weekends. I’m on track for around 2050 hours. I assume the partners would prefer I work over the weekend so they can shove more work at me, but no one has said anything about my lack of work during the weekend.

Even when I do get emails over the weekend, it’s followed by an apology for asking me to work on a weekend.

[Anonymous User]

Not every firm is a sweatshop. Like some other OP said, if you're in the right practice, at the right firm, and have some decent discipline, you can bill 2000-2200 and very much have a robust life, including little-to-no weekend work.

What practice group offers this

I’m in a comp/benefits practice at a market paying firm, and I usually get my weekends. I’m on track for around 2050 hours. I assume the partners would prefer I work over the weekend so they can shove more work at me, but no one has said anything about my lack of work during the weekend.

Even when I do get emails over the weekend, it’s followed by an apology for asking me to work on a weekend.

Comp/benefits income partner here. I've worked an average of 1800 hrs the last two years. On pace for around 2100 this year due to some departures in the group, but it's honestly been fine. Still have rarely had to work on the weekend, usually just once every couple months if a deal is signing or closing. Honestly, I really like my job and they keep making it easier and easier to stay by paying me more comp every year.

I might never make equity partner but I'm beginning to come to terms with the fact that I might prefer that since I can clear $600k a year with little weekend work and little to no business development responsibilities.

[Anonymous User]

Not every firm is a sweatshop. Like some other OP said, if you're in the right practice, at the right firm, and have some decent discipline, you can bill 2000-2200 and very much have a robust life, including little-to-no weekend work.

What practice group offers this

I’m in a comp/benefits practice at a market paying firm, and I usually get my weekends. I’m on track for around 2050 hours. I assume the partners would prefer I work over the weekend so they can shove more work at me, but no one has said anything about my lack of work during the weekend.

Even when I do get emails over the weekend, it’s followed by an apology for asking me to work on a weekend.

Comp/benefits income partner here. I've worked an average of 1800 hrs the last two years. On pace for around 2100 this year due to some departures in the group, but it's honestly been fine. Still have rarely had to work on the weekend, usually just once every couple months if a deal is signing or closing. Honestly, I really like my job and they keep making it easier and easier to stay by paying me more comp every year.

I might never make equity partner but I'm beginning to come to terms with the fact that I might prefer that since I can clear $600k a year with little weekend work and little to no business development responsibilities.

Any chance you could post the salary grid or calculation for income partners at your firm?