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This is likely a very dumb question to those who are experts, but I am a measly peasant who doesn't know the answer so please spare me the ridicule. I know big law jobs, the V10 and better firms are largely present in NYC, LA, Chicago etc. but I was wondering if there is still big law in other cities, for example Philadelphia; are the large firms there considered big law or are they mid law or what? This market difference by city is where I get confused. Also, is there a salary differential between big law and mid law, other than differences that can be associated with cost of living in a more expensive city? I apologize if these questions are dumb but everyone uses the term big law and it can be ambiguous so I feel the need to ask. Any help would be greatly appreciated.

Yeah I think Jones Day has an office in San Diego

You're treating "biglaw" as if it has some hard and fast definition. It doesn't; "biglaw" has different definitions to different people. By the definition that I tend to use (pays the "market" rate for the city, usually has ~50+ attorneys across the firm), yes there are biglaw firms in other cities. Some of those cities (e.g. Cleveland) will have lower pay than their NY/LA/etc counterparts. Some cities will have the same pay.

As I now understand it, if you are in a large market and are paid [near] market and you handle fortune clients, consider yourself in BL (or at worse, BL lite). Especially true if your firm does not accept walk-ins and your firm structures bonuses similar to V-100 firms.

If you firm runs TV ads about divorces or has a full page yellow pages ad, it is not a BL firm.

go look at nalpdirectory and vault to determine what firms are traditionally considered big law and their locations.

quick answer - big law can be in cities such as Philadelphia (and even Tampa FL, etc.)

Great use of anon, also probably an 0L

Anonymous User wrote:This is likely a very dumb question to those who are experts, but I am a measly peasant who doesn't know the answer so please spare me the ridicule. I know big law jobs, the V10 and better firms are largely present in NYC, LA, Chicago etc. but I was wondering if there is still big law in other cities, for example Philadelphia; are the large firms there considered big law or are they mid law or what?

I think you answered your own question.

Sure but the vast majority of good 2L SA positions exist in the cities with the largest legal markets. All things equal, New York is the easiest place to get a biglaw job. Places like Seattle, Portland, Boston, and Austin are much harder.

Big law firms have satellite offices in tons of smaller cities. The offices often take summers, pay market, etc., but the range of practices can be very limited. For example, Dechert Charlotte pays 160k in a low COL area, but according to their web site they pretty much only do real estate finance in their Charlotte office. If you're not 100% set on that, you're better off starting out in a major market.