In terms of prestige, does the firm or the office location matter more? Forum
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Re: In terms of prestige, does the firm or the office location matter more?
As I get older I’m becoming more aware there there are lots of people for whom fast-paced city life is not the vibe. Some people really do just want to make a decent living and be able to have ample time for friend and family and vacation and weddings, and not everyone is an overachieving megalomaniac set on V4 world domination at the cost of physical and mental health and social life. The two sides of this “debate” are talking at cross-purposes.
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Re: In terms of prestige, does the firm or the office location matter more?
Biglaw lawyers argue over prestige because it’s all they have to argue about when everyone gets paid about the same and they define themselves by their job because the hours take up their whole lives. People like distinctions and divisions. If there aren’t any, they make them up or blow up small, negligible differences into big ones. Other industries and jobs don’t have this as much because pay, bonuses, equity, perks, the free time they have, or the products they build do all the talking. Unless you’re writing great briefs or arguing big cases before high courts, there is no prestige. Transactional lawyers are largely fungible, so who cares. Unless you’re at Wachtell stacking bills. But for generic market-paying firms paying within 10-20k of each other, just take the money and build a life and “prestige” outside of your paper pushing job. Go to the market you want to live in.
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Re: In terms of prestige, does the firm or the office location matter more?
that pays more, you keep forgetting that it pays more.Anonymous User wrote: ↑Sun Oct 03, 2021 12:50 pmOne is a growing legal market with a lower cost of living, with more firms moving in. Comparatively, though, it has fewer firms and fewer biglaw attorneys practicing there.
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Re: In terms of prestige, does the firm or the office location matter more?
Wait, what part of this is questionable "living"? Being a cog in a higher-ranked machine where your effort and very existence will be forgotten years if not months after your departure? Servicing slightly larger clients? Having a family you can spend time with?Anonymous User wrote: ↑Sun Oct 03, 2021 2:16 amBy your logic, it would be smart to join some shrinking V90 firm in the South with minimal deal flow so you can make market and still get home to the suburbs in time for dinner since you only have local and relatively mom-and-pop clients. If that’s your idea of living, Godspeed.
This is a actual question. What does "living" entail to you? Your conceptions are so alien to me it feels like we are different species.
Last edited by Anonymous User on Sun Oct 03, 2021 2:54 pm, edited 1 time in total.
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Re: In terms of prestige, does the firm or the office location matter more?
I’m pretty sure parts of Des Moines biglaw are unironically very competitive, Belin McCormick is as selective as the top Chicago/NY firms. You get a nice house, a 9-6, a bunch of colleagues from HLS, a fast track to a federal/SSC judgeship, and more money in real terms than NYC, it’s probably one of the best gigs in the country for those wired up to want reasonable lives. Also, like Utahans and New Yorkers, IME Iowans often think it’s God’s own country and have strong desires to return.Anonymous User wrote: ↑Sun Oct 03, 2021 12:50 pmOh I don't disagree, and I don't think I said anything to that effect. Most law students aren't weighing one or the other. Hell, it's possible that nearly every law student in the country would strike out if they tried to land a firm job in Des Moines, IA. So what? My point is that Anywhere, TX and New York are going to be night-and-day different (even in one of Texas's major metro areas).nixy wrote: ↑Sun Oct 03, 2021 10:01 amI mean, there are definitely people who could get hired in NYC and not Texas, because class size and ties.Anonymous User wrote: ↑Sun Oct 03, 2021 8:37 amYou had me until the end.Anonymous User wrote: ↑Sat Oct 02, 2021 12:43 pm. . . Also, with cross-staffing (especially post-Covid), I know many people who live in, say, a Texas office but work 100% on deals out of the NYC office. So they’re doing literally the same job as an NYC associate, but with 11% higher pay, no face time requirement, and living either in a luxury apartment next to the office or a huge house 20 mins away. If I were an NYC associate on the same deal team, I’d feel pretty damn silly in comparison.
Pretty sure that most people living and working in New York City are there because they want to, gasp, be in New York City — and not because they couldn't land the coveted Texas gig.![]()
But lol just lol at this whole debate.
One is a growing legal market with a lower cost of living, with more firms moving in. Comparatively, though, it has fewer firms and fewer biglaw attorneys practicing there.
The other is the largest city in the country (and is arguably the "capital of the world" insofar as such a thing exists), with the largest legal and financial market in the country, and headquarters to many of the country's elite law firms.
I'll let everyone guess as to which is which...
Also, what? Is this comment from 1990? Tons of people consider both TX and NY firms
Last edited by Anonymous User on Sun Oct 03, 2021 1:19 pm, edited 1 time in total.
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Re: In terms of prestige, does the firm or the office location matter more?
Almost all law students outside their desired secondary market split bids between NY and the secondary market. The decision then involves weighing both because it is entirely possible--even likely--that they will land a NY firm that is "better" in NY than their secondary firm choice is in the secondary market, just given the competitiveness in secondary markets even for top students.
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Re: In terms of prestige, does the firm or the office location matter more?
It’s pretty obvious to me he’s amplifying New York as some mythical, life-changing experience. Maybe he’s overcompensating because he’s in fact miserable as all hell, billing 2400+ hours while those in secondary markets are working less, making comparatively more, yet still retaining solid exit options. Strange indeed.Anonymous User wrote: ↑Sun Oct 03, 2021 1:13 pmWait, what part of this is questionable "living"? Being a cog in a higher-ranked machine where your effort and very existence will be forgotten months if not years after your departure? Servicing slightly larger clients? Having a family you can spend time with?Anonymous User wrote: ↑Sun Oct 03, 2021 2:16 amBy your logic, it would be smart to join some shrinking V90 firm in the South with minimal deal flow so you can make market and still get home to the suburbs in time for dinner since you only have local and relatively mom-and-pop clients. If that’s your idea of living, Godspeed.
This is a actual question. What does "living" entail to you? Your conceptions are so alien to me it feels like we are different species.
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Re: In terms of prestige, does the firm or the office location matter more?
We may well be. And that’s my point.Anonymous User wrote: ↑Sun Oct 03, 2021 1:13 pmWait, what part of this is questionable "living"? Being a cog in a higher-ranked machine where your effort and very existence will be forgotten months if not years after your departure? Servicing slightly larger clients? Having a family you can spend time with?Anonymous User wrote: ↑Sun Oct 03, 2021 2:16 amBy your logic, it would be smart to join some shrinking V90 firm in the South with minimal deal flow so you can make market and still get home to the suburbs in time for dinner since you only have local and relatively mom-and-pop clients. If that’s your idea of living, Godspeed.
This is a actual question. What does "living" entail to you? Your conceptions are so alien to me it feels like we are different species.
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Re: In terms of prestige, does the firm or the office location matter more?
So a Cravath associate is equal in all respects to someone at Dechert Philadelphia or Haynes Boone Dallas because the latter two take home the same if not more money? Surely no one believes that.
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Re: In terms of prestige, does the firm or the office location matter more?
I'm SOOOOO much more prestigious than you, working at cravath by the way. The fact that you make more money is totally irrelevant because I subsist on the 'good work' emails from partners before going home to my $3500/month one bedroom. Enjoy spending time with your stupid friends and family.Anonymous User wrote: ↑Sun Oct 03, 2021 1:42 pmSo a Cravath associate is equal in all respects to someone at Dechert Philadelphia or Haynes Boone Dallas because the latter two take home the same if not more money? Surely no one believes that.
Last edited by Anonymous User on Sun Oct 03, 2021 1:49 pm, edited 1 time in total.
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Re: In terms of prestige, does the firm or the office location matter more?
That is why my post included a question. Mind answering?Anonymous User wrote: ↑Sun Oct 03, 2021 1:33 pmWe may well be. And that’s my point.Anonymous User wrote: ↑Sun Oct 03, 2021 1:13 pmWait, what part of this is questionable "living"? Being a cog in a higher-ranked machine where your effort and very existence will be forgotten months if not years after your departure? Servicing slightly larger clients? Having a family you can spend time with?Anonymous User wrote: ↑Sun Oct 03, 2021 2:16 amBy your logic, it would be smart to join some shrinking V90 firm in the South with minimal deal flow so you can make market and still get home to the suburbs in time for dinner since you only have local and relatively mom-and-pop clients. If that’s your idea of living, Godspeed.
This is a actual question. What does "living" entail to you? Your conceptions are so alien to me it feels like we are different species.
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Re: In terms of prestige, does the firm or the office location matter more?
Yup. At my T14, NYC biglaw was the “safety” play that career services urged you to do in case your preferred market didn’t work out. It was also the last-minute pivot they did when someone struck out, including from Texas specifically. I had multiple friends strike out of Texas at OCI and then get an NYC firm in the months that followed.Anonymous User wrote: ↑Sun Oct 03, 2021 1:18 pmAlmost all law students outside their desired secondary market split bids between NY and the secondary market. The decision then involves weighing both because it is entirely possible--even likely--that they will land a NY firm that is "better" in NY than their secondary firm choice is in the secondary market, just given the competitiveness in secondary markets even for top students.
The fact that New Yorkers treat getting a job there as some huge accomplishment that makes them better than associates at the same firm in a different market is sad and hilarious. GPA medians for OCI at NYC offices were never higher than at other offices, often lower.
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Re: In terms of prestige, does the firm or the office location matter more?
This used to be true but FYI the Raiders moved to VegasPennoyer v. Meh wrote: ↑Fri Oct 01, 2021 7:21 pmThis is false.tlsguy2020 wrote: ↑Fri Oct 01, 2021 2:34 pmThe difference between Kirkland SF and Kirkland Chicago is that Kirkland SF associates have better weather and Kirkland Chicago associates have (generally) better food.
SF associates also have better pro sports.
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Re: In terms of prestige, does the firm or the office location matter more?
I went to undergrad in a small town where almost no one who graduated from the college remained in town after school. I went to law school in a big city. I've learned that there's a certain type of person who enjoys a slower pace of life, quiet neighborhoods, fences around swings and that sort of thing. There are also people who find that sort of thing boring and may begin to drift toward that lifestyle only closer to retirement. If the very idea that some people choose altogether not have have families, or even get married, and may instead care more about working with more sophisticated clients (slightly larger, lol) in an office which draws much more heavily from vastly more competitive and diverse schools and backgrounds rather than staffing 1/3 of the office from the local USNWR 50-70 is "so alien" to you, you've revealed yourself as a public school non-target graduate and I'm glad there are secondary and tertiary markets where you fit right in.Anonymous User wrote: ↑Sun Oct 03, 2021 1:47 pmThat is why my post included a question. Mind answering?Anonymous User wrote: ↑Sun Oct 03, 2021 1:33 pmWe may well be. And that’s my point.Anonymous User wrote: ↑Sun Oct 03, 2021 1:13 pmWait, what part of this is questionable "living"? Being a cog in a higher-ranked machine where your effort and very existence will be forgotten months if not years after your departure? Servicing slightly larger clients? Having a family you can spend time with?Anonymous User wrote: ↑Sun Oct 03, 2021 2:16 amBy your logic, it would be smart to join some shrinking V90 firm in the South with minimal deal flow so you can make market and still get home to the suburbs in time for dinner since you only have local and relatively mom-and-pop clients. If that’s your idea of living, Godspeed.
This is a actual question. What does "living" entail to you? Your conceptions are so alien to me it feels like we are different species.
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Re: In terms of prestige, does the firm or the office location matter more?
Anonymous User wrote: ↑Sun Oct 03, 2021 3:20 pmI went to undergrad in a small town where almost no one who graduated from the college remained in town after school. I went to law school in a big city. I've learned that there's a certain type of person who enjoys a slower pace of life, quiet neighborhoods, fences around swings and that sort of thing. There are also people who find that sort of thing boring and may begin to drift toward that lifestyle only closer to retirement. If the very idea that some people choose altogether not have have families, or even get married, and may instead care more about working with more sophisticated clients (slightly larger, lol) in an office which draws much more heavily from vastly more competitive and diverse schools and backgrounds rather than staffing 1/3 of the office from the local USNWR 50-70 law school is "so alien" to you, you've revealed yourself as a public school non-target graduate and I'm glad there are secondary and tertiary markets where you fit right in.Anonymous User wrote: ↑Sun Oct 03, 2021 1:47 pmThat is why my post included a question. Mind answering?Anonymous User wrote: ↑Sun Oct 03, 2021 1:33 pmWe may well be. And that’s my point.Anonymous User wrote: ↑Sun Oct 03, 2021 1:13 pmWait, what part of this is questionable "living"? Being a cog in a higher-ranked machine where your effort and very existence will be forgotten months if not years after your departure? Servicing slightly larger clients? Having a family you can spend time with?Anonymous User wrote: ↑Sun Oct 03, 2021 2:16 amBy your logic, it would be smart to join some shrinking V90 firm in the South with minimal deal flow so you can make market and still get home to the suburbs in time for dinner since you only have local and relatively mom-and-pop clients. If that’s your idea of living, Godspeed.
This is a actual question. What does "living" entail to you? Your conceptions are so alien to me it feels like we are different species.
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Re: In terms of prestige, does the firm or the office location matter more?
TIL San Francisco, Chicago, Houston, Philly, and Boston are "slower pace of life" and "quiet neighborhoods". Anon is really prioritizing the persistent car horns of New York trafficAnonymous User wrote: ↑Sun Oct 03, 2021 3:20 pmI went to undergrad in a small town where almost no one who graduated from the college remained in town after school. I went to law school in a big city. I've learned that there's a certain type of person who enjoys a slower pace of life, quiet neighborhoods, fences around swings and that sort of thing. There are also people who find that sort of thing boring and may begin to drift toward that lifestyle only closer to retirement. If the very idea that some people choose altogether not have have families, or even get married, and may instead care more about working with more sophisticated clients (slightly larger, lol) in an office which draws much more heavily from vastly more competitive and diverse schools and backgrounds rather than staffing 1/3 of the office from the local USNWR 50-70 is "so alien" to you, you've revealed yourself as a public school non-target graduate and I'm glad there are secondary and tertiary markets where you fit right in.Anonymous User wrote: ↑Sun Oct 03, 2021 1:47 pmThat is why my post included a question. Mind answering?Anonymous User wrote: ↑Sun Oct 03, 2021 1:33 pmWe may well be. And that’s my point.Anonymous User wrote: ↑Sun Oct 03, 2021 1:13 pmWait, what part of this is questionable "living"? Being a cog in a higher-ranked machine where your effort and very existence will be forgotten months if not years after your departure? Servicing slightly larger clients? Having a family you can spend time with?Anonymous User wrote: ↑Sun Oct 03, 2021 2:16 amBy your logic, it would be smart to join some shrinking V90 firm in the South with minimal deal flow so you can make market and still get home to the suburbs in time for dinner since you only have local and relatively mom-and-pop clients. If that’s your idea of living, Godspeed.
This is a actual question. What does "living" entail to you? Your conceptions are so alien to me it feels like we are different species.

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Re: In terms of prestige, does the firm or the office location matter more?
This thread is getting spicy / controversial because there are lots of people who took jobs with big firms in small offices who desperately want to believe that they're deserving of the same esteem as their colleagues at HQ, whether that be in New York or elsewhere.
But thank the gods they have a few extra bucks in their checking accounts, right?
But thank the gods they have a few extra bucks in their checking accounts, right?
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Re: In terms of prestige, does the firm or the office location matter more?
Lol did you just straightup imagine that OP cited NY in their post? Could you quote that? Almost all of the cites you listed are HQ for big firms. Are you lost?Anonymous User wrote: ↑Sun Oct 03, 2021 3:30 pmTIL San Francisco, Chicago, Houston, Philly, and Boston are "slower pace of life" and "quiet neighborhoods". Anon is really prioritizing the persistent car horns of New York trafficAnonymous User wrote: ↑Sun Oct 03, 2021 3:20 pmI went to undergrad in a small town where almost no one who graduated from the college remained in town after school. I went to law school in a big city. I've learned that there's a certain type of person who enjoys a slower pace of life, quiet neighborhoods, fences around swings and that sort of thing. There are also people who find that sort of thing boring and may begin to drift toward that lifestyle only closer to retirement. If the very idea that some people choose altogether not have have families, or even get married, and may instead care more about working with more sophisticated clients (slightly larger, lol) in an office which draws much more heavily from vastly more competitive and diverse schools and backgrounds rather than staffing 1/3 of the office from the local USNWR 50-70 is "so alien" to you, you've revealed yourself as a public school non-target graduate and I'm glad there are secondary and tertiary markets where you fit right in.Anonymous User wrote: ↑Sun Oct 03, 2021 1:47 pmThat is why my post included a question. Mind answering?Anonymous User wrote: ↑Sun Oct 03, 2021 1:33 pmWe may well be. And that’s my point.Anonymous User wrote: ↑Sun Oct 03, 2021 1:13 pmWait, what part of this is questionable "living"? Being a cog in a higher-ranked machine where your effort and very existence will be forgotten months if not years after your departure? Servicing slightly larger clients? Having a family you can spend time with?Anonymous User wrote: ↑Sun Oct 03, 2021 2:16 amBy your logic, it would be smart to join some shrinking V90 firm in the South with minimal deal flow so you can make market and still get home to the suburbs in time for dinner since you only have local and relatively mom-and-pop clients. If that’s your idea of living, Godspeed.
This is a actual question. What does "living" entail to you? Your conceptions are so alien to me it feels like we are different species.![]()
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Re: In terms of prestige, does the firm or the office location matter more?
brave anonAnonymous User wrote: ↑Sun Oct 03, 2021 3:33 pmThis thread is getting spicy / controversial because there are lots of people who took jobs with big firms in small offices who desperately want to believe that they're deserving of the same esteem as their colleagues at HQ, whether that be in New York or elsewhere.
But thank the gods they have a few extra bucks in their checking accounts, right?
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Re: In terms of prestige, does the firm or the office location matter more?
I know this is difficult for you to imagine, but I assure you that associates in non-HQ (yet marking paying) offices are not thinking at all whatsoever what their HQ colleagues think of them.Anonymous User wrote: ↑Sun Oct 03, 2021 3:33 pmThis thread is getting spicy / controversial because there are lots of people who took jobs with big firms in small offices who desperately want to believe that they're deserving of the same esteem as their colleagues at HQ, whether that be in New York or elsewhere.
But thank the gods they have a few extra bucks in their checking accounts, right?
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Re: In terms of prestige, does the firm or the office location matter more?
I mean I know I'd be embarrassed to post that kind of hot take under my actual internet pseudonym.The Lsat Airbender wrote: ↑Sun Oct 03, 2021 3:38 pmbrave anonAnonymous User wrote: ↑Sun Oct 03, 2021 3:33 pmThis thread is getting spicy / controversial because there are lots of people who took jobs with big firms in small offices who desperately want to believe that they're deserving of the same esteem as their colleagues at HQ, whether that be in New York or elsewhere.
But thank the gods they have a few extra bucks in their checking accounts, right?
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Re: In terms of prestige, does the firm or the office location matter more?
Congrats on taking a 15% pay cut so you can have the privilege of working longer and paying higher rent. You're so prestigious it's mind boggling.Anonymous User wrote: ↑Sun Oct 03, 2021 3:33 pmBut thank the gods they have a few extra bucks in their checking accounts, right?
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Re: In terms of prestige, does the firm or the office location matter more?
The people taking the bait are likewise smart to hide their fake identitiesnixy wrote: ↑Sun Oct 03, 2021 3:51 pmI mean I know I'd be embarrassed to post that kind of hot take under my actual internet pseudonym.The Lsat Airbender wrote: ↑Sun Oct 03, 2021 3:38 pmbrave anonAnonymous User wrote: ↑Sun Oct 03, 2021 3:33 pmThis thread is getting spicy / controversial because there are lots of people who took jobs with big firms in small offices who desperately want to believe that they're deserving of the same esteem as their colleagues at HQ, whether that be in New York or elsewhere.
But thank the gods they have a few extra bucks in their checking accounts, right?

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Re: In terms of prestige, does the firm or the office location matter more?
lol you really are all over the place. No one said anything about what their colleagues think of them; rather, they want to believe -- because many, though of course not all, couldn't have been or simply weren't hired at HQ -- that because they're paid the same and have the same firm name on their LinkedIn, that they are, in fact, the same. Privately, though, they know they're not, so they console themselves by pointing to the extra hours of R&R and more take-home pay, then say "Aha! We're even! Big Law prestige is a myth." Motivated reasoning is very interesting.Anonymous User wrote: ↑Sun Oct 03, 2021 3:46 pmI know this is difficult for you to imagine, but I assure you that associates in non-HQ (yet marking paying) offices are not thinking at all whatsoever what their HQ colleagues think of them.Anonymous User wrote: ↑Sun Oct 03, 2021 3:33 pmThis thread is getting spicy / controversial because there are lots of people who took jobs with big firms in small offices who desperately want to believe that they're deserving of the same esteem as their colleagues at HQ, whether that be in New York or elsewhere.
But thank the gods they have a few extra bucks in their checking accounts, right?
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Re: In terms of prestige, does the firm or the office location matter more?
Self esteem literally coming from slightly larger numbers on disclosure schedules.Anonymous User wrote: ↑Sun Oct 03, 2021 3:20 pmmay instead care more about working with more sophisticated clients (slightly larger, lol)
Seriously? What are you waiting for?
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