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Longtime lurker and 1L with connections to the market at a t13 who's beginning to think about where I would ultimately like to end up. As someone with connections to the area and who has little desire to work NYC hours, I'm wondering what the catch is with Miami big law.

From browsing this forum, it appears that certain satellites such as White & Case pay NYC rates, but presumably with less hours of work. I've seen the number 45 on this forum thrown around for the amount of hours the typical big law associate works in Miami.

Naturally, I am skeptical about how this all can be so, and have some questions regarding Miami big law.

I've seen mentioned on this forum that the hours at the satellites are not as good as the non-satellites and that the chances of making partner at a satellite are basically 0.

Beyond this, I was wondering how partner compensation compares to NYC since associate salaries are the same at some firms. I realize that this is getting ahead of myself, but I'm still curious.

If it matters, I am potentially interested in tax, but am by no means committed to this. I'm wondering how much this would matter, since I've seen some people mention that Miami firms are good at things such as real estate.

(1) White & Case Miami, from what I’ve heard, works NY hours basically (perhaps there are less people who get absolutely destroyed in a given year). I got the impression that people there bill ~2,200 a year, but even if I’m overestimating, I can practically guarantee you that you won’t be working 45 hours a week (unless you mean billable). Think about it; no one is gonna pay you NY scale to work 45 hours a week.

(2) If your “connections” to the market are something short of actually being from south florida, you’re going to have a hard time at OCI; something to consider.

(3) you are right in believing your chances of partnership at the satellites are 0; people usually make bank for a few years and then lateral to a local shop where partnership is possible (or go in house or to the gov).

(4) I have no idea about partner compensation at the big firms, but that shouldn’t matter since your chances of making partner at a big firm in NY are also extremely unlikely (unless maybe you are the kid of a billionaire or something where you have an instant mega book of business)

(5) what I can tell miami has a practically non-existent amount of tax opportunities. The opportunities that exist seem to be high net worth individual tax, which in my opinion is alot less sexy than practicing tax in NY

There are many, many threads on this, but I’ll bite.

I used to work in the area so know some of the answers.

1) 45 hours is, in my opinion, unrealistic at any large firm, be it White & Case or Carlton Fields, for an associate who isn’t coasting. I think the 45 hours referred to the average billable hours at the firms that work their associates. 45 hours at 48 weeks is 2160, which sounds about right for the higher end. But I’ve heard of associates working 2200-2300 even at the Miami firms’ corporate departments.

2) partnership chances are lower at the satellites and they are more leveraged. This seems to be because there are a couple of rainmakers that have enough work for 3-4 associates (or more). Some of the firms have local clients while others are just small outposts where associates do mostly NY work and some small amount of latam work.

3) no idea about partner comp at the NY satellites compared to NY, but I’m assuming they’re comparable because these partners seem to have big books of business.

4) if you’re trying to do tax in Miami, I hope you know Portuguese or Spanish. That’s almost a requirement, it seems. Also, as the previous poster mentioned, most tax is HNW, so it won’t be sexy corporate tax. I think GT and HK have some corporate tax in Miami, but I don’t know if many of the satellites do.