Any juniors who have left biglaw and never looked back? Forum

[Anonymous User]

You can absolutely save enough for a comfortable retirement on $175k a year (including government benefits). If you compare yourself to biglaw partners, you’re going to be dissatisfied, but the vast majority of people in the world aren’t biglaw partners.

Plus I’m not sure why you’re talking about a 10+ yr biglaw person when the OP was asking about leaving as a junior. They’re not sticking around 10+ years.

"where are you now" doesn't have to mean 5 seconds later, it can also mean 5 years later. And for the type of social groups that lawyers keep, its going to be very tough to retire comfortably on $175k/year. For a lot of people that means 0 savings outside your 401k, with perhaps substantial debt as well. If you are going to live in rural Pennsylvania and your friends are in manual labor, then a $175k career cap on earnings can lead to a reasonable retirement. If you live in Manhattan and your friends are lawyers/doctors/bankers it is basically the road to bankruptcy.

Also the opportunity cost of going to law school to cap your career earnings at $175k is really really high, relative to other jobs you could have done.

lol, okay. Enjoy biglaw.

Continually shocked to learn people consider my extremely nice and comfortable lifestyle is not possible

The numbers just don't work for me at that salary level. Let's say you are single, never married, no kids. You work as a lawyer in a VHCOL city (say Manhattan). Let's think about reasonable monthly expenses for a lawyer with 10+ years of experience:

Rent: $4k
Food: $3k (mostly takeout, but some groceries)
Discretionary: $1k
401k:$2k
Taxes: $4.5k
Total: $14.5k

Your monthly salary is $14.5k, so you are basically living paycheck to paycheck, and likely underwater given that you also want to take vacations, etc...

I get hating biglaw and wanting to bail after a few years, and many people do it, but there is a big difference between landing in house and eventually making $400k versus landing in government and making $175k tops. It seems like the first option can still give you a reasonably comfortable lifestyle, albeit not as comfortable as biglaw perma-counsel, but the first option is likely to leave you living paycheck-to-paycheck and regretting getting out of biglaw too soon.

[Anonymous User]

OP here. Really just seeking input from people who left biglaw as a junior, and not on the financial implications of living a luxurious lifestyle in NYC. I don’t plan on sticking around because I came to biglaw to pay off my law school debt (which I’ve been able to do), so these are not really concerns I’m having. Not trying to live a fancy lifestyle—would rather have free time in what’s left of my younger years. Looking for folks who left the junior associate due diligence holes and are happy.

[Anonymous User]

I left biglaw after one year, did two clerkships, and then went to a plaintiff's firm, where I find the work rewarding (with a much lower salary than biglaw, obviously). No regrets.

[Anonymous User]

You can absolutely save enough for a comfortable retirement on $175k a year (including government benefits). If you compare yourself to biglaw partners, you’re going to be dissatisfied, but the vast majority of people in the world aren’t biglaw partners.

Plus I’m not sure why you’re talking about a 10+ yr biglaw person when the OP was asking about leaving as a junior. They’re not sticking around 10+ years.

"where are you now" doesn't have to mean 5 seconds later, it can also mean 5 years later. And for the type of social groups that lawyers keep, its going to be very tough to retire comfortably on $175k/year. For a lot of people that means 0 savings outside your 401k, with perhaps substantial debt as well. If you are going to live in rural Pennsylvania and your friends are in manual labor, then a $175k career cap on earnings can lead to a reasonable retirement. If you live in Manhattan and your friends are lawyers/doctors/bankers it is basically the road to bankruptcy.

Also the opportunity cost of going to law school to cap your career earnings at $175k is really really high, relative to other jobs you could have done.

lol, okay. Enjoy biglaw.

Continually shocked to learn people consider my extremely nice and comfortable lifestyle is not possible

The numbers just don't work for me at that salary level. Let's say you are single, never married, no kids. You work as a lawyer in a VHCOL city (say Manhattan). Let's think about reasonable monthly expenses for a lawyer with 10+ years of experience:

Rent: $4k
Food: $3k (mostly takeout, but some groceries)
Discretionary: $1k
401k:$2k
Taxes: $4.5k
Total: $14.5k

Your monthly salary is $14.5k, so you are basically living paycheck to paycheck, and likely underwater given that you also want to take vacations, etc...

I get hating biglaw and wanting to bail after a few years, and many people do it, but there is a big difference between landing in house and eventually making $400k versus landing in government and making $175k tops. It seems like the first option can still give you a reasonably comfortable lifestyle, albeit not as comfortable as biglaw perma-counsel, but the first option is likely to leave you living paycheck-to-paycheck and regretting getting out of biglaw too soon.

$100 a day on food is "reasonable" for someone with no spouse or kids?
edit wait they listed 401(k) as an "expense" damn I fell for the troll

[Excellent117]

$100 a day on food is "reasonable" for someone with no spouse or kids?
edit wait they listed 401(k) as an "expense" damn I fell for the troll

[Res Ipsa Loquitter]

You can absolutely save enough for a comfortable retirement on $175k a year (including government benefits). If you compare yourself to biglaw partners, you’re going to be dissatisfied, but the vast majority of people in the world aren’t biglaw partners.

Plus I’m not sure why you’re talking about a 10+ yr biglaw person when the OP was asking about leaving as a junior. They’re not sticking around 10+ years.

"where are you now" doesn't have to mean 5 seconds later, it can also mean 5 years later. And for the type of social groups that lawyers keep, its going to be very tough to retire comfortably on $175k/year. For a lot of people that means 0 savings outside your 401k, with perhaps substantial debt as well. If you are going to live in rural Pennsylvania and your friends are in manual labor, then a $175k career cap on earnings can lead to a reasonable retirement. If you live in Manhattan and your friends are lawyers/doctors/bankers it is basically the road to bankruptcy.

Also the opportunity cost of going to law school to cap your career earnings at $175k is really really high, relative to other jobs you could have done.

lol, okay. Enjoy biglaw.

Continually shocked to learn people consider my extremely nice and comfortable lifestyle is not possible

The numbers just don't work for me at that salary level. Let's say you are single, never married, no kids. You work as a lawyer in a VHCOL city (say Manhattan). Let's think about reasonable monthly expenses for a lawyer with 10+ years of experience:

Rent: $4k
Food: $3k (mostly takeout, but some groceries)
Discretionary: $1k
401k:$2k
Taxes: $4.5k
Total: $14.5k

Your monthly salary is $14.5k, so you are basically living paycheck to paycheck, and likely underwater given that you also want to take vacations, etc...

I get hating biglaw and wanting to bail after a few years, and many people do it, but there is a big difference between landing in house and eventually making $400k versus landing in government and making $175k tops. It seems like the first option can still give you a reasonably comfortable lifestyle, albeit not as comfortable as biglaw perma-counsel, but the first option is likely to leave you living paycheck-to-paycheck and regretting getting out of biglaw too soon.

$100 a day on food is "reasonable" for someone with no spouse or kids?
edit wait they listed 401(k) as an "expense" damn I fell for the troll

$3000 a month to feed one person is dumb, but it actually is easy to end up paycheck to paycheck on 10K a month take home. Lots of people do it. Kids, dating, gifts, vacations, hobbies, shopping, gambling. Countless ways to waste money.

[Mountainvalleywater]

I'm maxing out my 401k and eating at sit down classy restaurants 7 days a week, but only a measly $1k left over in monthly free cash spending. How will I ever survive?

Please god let that be a troll and not real, and if it is get a hard core reality check from your bubble of utter privilege.

OP - you can take a big in-house paycut and live a perfectly normal life, albeit not one where you are going to be living in luxury.

I went in house as a junior associate (3rd year) and took a medium paycut to -$150k total comp. My job was freaking easy, my days did not go past 6:30pm (hell - pre-Covid I got to even leave my computer at my office for "it security" reasons so I couldn't even work nights if I wanted to) and my coworkers were chill. Having actual PTO days that are respected and used by everyone (as opposed to unlimited PTO bs) is awesome. So many random Fridays or half days I took off because I just had a bunch of PTO days banked and wanted a break.

I still ended up going back to biglaw because I was bored out of my mind, realized I kind of liked having loads of money, and I started a family and kids + school + houses are unbelievably expensive these days.

My in house job, and many out there, aren't jobs with clear promotion tracks and compensation tends to be much more flat depending on when you enter. There were many attorneys in my department who had been in the same roles for 10-20 years without any significant promotion. It still worked for many of them. They knew their job well and it was an easy paycheck every two weeks. Most could max out retirement accounts and live a solidly middle class life after everything else. Plus, these days it's increasingly common to be dual-income households. Two "easy" $150-200k/yr jobs equals $300-400k annual income which is still a LOT of money in this day and age despite inflation and all.

Personally I'm planning on going back in house, just hoping to cash out of biglaw a bit more and move back at a more senior level to start with the (often significantly) increased comp package as compared to going in house as a junior associate. The 6-10 year in house roles pay a lot more than the 2-4 year in house gigs in my experience.

[Anonymous User]

The comparison with a 10+ year biglaw person isn't appropriate because the OP's whole point was wanting to get out of biglaw. Of course you end up with 10 years of experience at that point down the road, but comparing a government salary with a 10-year *biglaw* salary is dumb if the person in question was never going to stay in biglaw 10 years.

The other thing to note is that government lifers often do end up as supervisors at some point, which ups their salary, and the salary cap isn't going to be literally $175K for the rest of someone's life - salaries do increase with cost of living.

In any case, there are plenty of biglaw refugees who do take these miserably-paid positions and who do stay in them for life, and they aren't all going to come from family wealth or have a high-earning spouse, so it's almost like different people value different things.

[Anonymous User]

$3000 a month to feed one person is dumb, but it actually is easy to end up paycheck to paycheck on 10K a month take home. Lots of people do it. Kids, dating, gifts, vacations, hobbies, shopping, gambling. Countless ways to waste money.

Oh, I believe it. Just not sure how much more money they'd have to make to no longer be living paycheck to paycheck - you can always find more, better, costlier ways to spend money if the money is there.

[Anonymous User]

OP here. Really just seeking input from people who left biglaw as a junior, and not on the financial implications of living a luxurious lifestyle in NYC. I don’t plan on sticking around because I came to biglaw to pay off my law school debt (which I’ve been able to do), so these are not really concerns I’m having. Not trying to live a fancy lifestyle—would rather have free time in what’s left of my younger years. Looking for folks who left the junior associate due diligence holes and are happy.

I left biglaw after year 4. AUSA now.

There's a skewing on this forum toward lawyers who are recent grads and who are motivated about biglaw. Keep that in mind while perusing through comments. I happen to be in neither of those categories. Many of them think that having a yacht but dying of a heart condition at age 62 with kids who hate them and (I'm male) 2 ex-wives is a cool plan, because who doesn't love yachts. Not for me. Most lawyers figure it out and get out way before then.

Many of them are also not accounting for the significant risk factors of attempting to survive the biglaw racket. To actually make it to that yacht, you have to assume that over the next 10-15 years you will (a) collect a large book of business that others are also competing for, and (b) not get taken down by hostile competition in general, through political squabbles that result in firing, lost clients, or whatever. Those are just the business risks; forget about the personal, emotional, and health risks. (Divorces. Mental health breakdowns. Medical problems because you will not be exercising sufficiently. Etc.)

The question of whether living a non-biglaw life can actually result in sustainable life and retirement kind of answers itself, doesn't it? What an absurd question to ask. If you are consistently earning an average of, let's say, $150,000 a year in 2023 dollars throughout your lifetime, plus accruing pension benefits, plus the federal TSP and other plans, do you really think retirement is out of the question?

[Anonymous User]

Are there really AUSAs in SDNY/EDNY making 175K 4-6 years out of law school? I've heard much different...more like 90k is the norm with 4-6 YOE.

[ughbugchugplug]

OP here. Really just seeking input from people who left biglaw as a junior, and not on the financial implications of living a luxurious lifestyle in NYC. I don’t plan on sticking around because I came to biglaw to pay off my law school debt (which I’ve been able to do), so these are not really concerns I’m having. Not trying to live a fancy lifestyle—would rather have free time in what’s left of my younger years. Looking for folks who left the junior associate due diligence holes and are happy.

I left biglaw after year 4. AUSA now.

There's a skewing on this forum toward lawyers who are recent grads and who are motivated about biglaw. Keep that in mind while perusing through comments. I happen to be in neither of those categories. Many of them think that having a yacht but dying of a heart condition at age 62 with kids who hate them and (I'm male) 2 ex-wives is a cool plan, because who doesn't love yachts. Not for me. Most lawyers figure it out and get out way before then.

Many of them are also not accounting for the significant risk factors of attempting to survive the biglaw racket. To actually make it to that yacht, you have to assume that over the next 10-15 years you will (a) collect a large book of business that others are also competing for, and (b) not get taken down by hostile competition in general, through political squabbles that result in firing, lost clients, or whatever. Those are just the business risks; forget about the personal, emotional, and health risks. (Divorces. Mental health breakdowns. Medical problems because you will not be exercising sufficiently. Etc.)

The question of whether living a non-biglaw life can actually result in sustainable life and retirement kind of answers itself, doesn't it? What an absurd question to ask. If you are consistently earning an average of, let's say, $150,000 a year in 2023 dollars throughout your lifetime, plus accruing pension benefits, plus the federal TSP and other plans, do you really think retirement is out of the question?

It’s telling that people always give NY rent when arguing they can’t afford it. People, you can live outside NY! Lots of people do! New Jersey is nice! Connecticut is nice! And you can also live in less fancy parts of NY

[jotarokujo]

I get hating biglaw and wanting to bail after a few years, and many people do it, but there is a big difference between landing in house and eventually making $400k versus landing in government and making $175k tops. It seems like the first option can still give you a reasonably comfortable lifestyle, albeit not as comfortable as biglaw perma-counsel, but the first option is likely to leave you living paycheck-to-paycheck and regretting getting out of biglaw too soon.

i would recommend not making sharp distinctions between government and in house in terms of salary. plenty of in house does not compensate $400k and plenty of government (SEC, etc) pay 200+

and btw the rotating door between in house and government means that you it's not a permanent choice. plenty of people go FTC->in house and then back again

[Anonymous User]

I was burnt out and Big Law was not a fit for me, I was unhealthy and unhappy. Props to those who can manage it. I am in-house now and it is wonderful, worth the pay cut from my perspective. I am fully remote and rarely work weekends. I do still have student loans and the Big Law salary and bonuses would be huge to paying those off sooner, but I am very lucky to benefit from the COVID student loan pause. I have been saving a ton of money in a HYSA during the pause and should be down to five figures by 2024 (assuming payments resume this summer).

[Anonymous User]

Are there really AUSAs in SDNY/EDNY making 175K 4-6 years out of law school? I've heard much different...more like 90k is the norm with 4-6 YOE.

$175k is the absolute cap on AUSA salaries, so no, people 4-6 years out aren’t making that - the person using $175k as an example is fixated on the horrific idea that that is the maximum you will make EVER.

It looks like if you’re at the 25th percentile, at 6 yrs experience you’ll make about $113k in NYC (if I’ve calculated that correctly, it may not include the latest COL increase, which would make it around $117k). 4 years would be about $98k.

I get that’s a big cut from biglaw and doesn’t go as far in Manhattan as in other parts of the country, but USAOs seem to find plenty of people willing to work for those salaries. Those who find the salary horrific certainly don’t need to apply.

[Anonymous User]

(Also, random anecdote - there was a state COA judge in my law school market who left the court to go back to being a supervisor at the USAO because he needed the money.)

[Anonymous User]

OP here. Really just seeking input from people who left biglaw as a junior, and not on the financial implications of living a luxurious lifestyle in NYC. I don’t plan on sticking around because I came to biglaw to pay off my law school debt (which I’ve been able to do), so these are not really concerns I’m having. Not trying to live a fancy lifestyle—would rather have free time in what’s left of my younger years. Looking for folks who left the junior associate due diligence holes and are happy.

I left biglaw after year 4. AUSA now.

There's a skewing on this forum toward lawyers who are recent grads and who are motivated about biglaw. Keep that in mind while perusing through comments. I happen to be in neither of those categories. Many of them think that having a yacht but dying of a heart condition at age 62 with kids who hate them and (I'm male) 2 ex-wives is a cool plan, because who doesn't love yachts. Not for me. Most lawyers figure it out and get out way before then.

Many of them are also not accounting for the significant risk factors of attempting to survive the biglaw racket. To actually make it to that yacht, you have to assume that over the next 10-15 years you will (a) collect a large book of business that others are also competing for, and (b) not get taken down by hostile competition in general, through political squabbles that result in firing, lost clients, or whatever. Those are just the business risks; forget about the personal, emotional, and health risks. (Divorces. Mental health breakdowns. Medical problems because you will not be exercising sufficiently. Etc.)

The question of whether living a non-biglaw life can actually result in sustainable life and retirement kind of answers itself, doesn't it? What an absurd question to ask. If you are consistently earning an average of, let's say, $150,000 a year in 2023 dollars throughout your lifetime, plus accruing pension benefits, plus the federal TSP and other plans, do you really think retirement is out of the question?

I think this is a super-skewed view of biglaw. Maybe this is true for litigators, I wouldn't know (and would strongly discourage anyone from becoming a litigator, certainly from a financial perspective), but the idea that being a corporate/tax/ERISA lawyer requires enourmous endurance, rainmaking, and political skills is just a wacky idea. Sure - if you want to be a partner and make $3 million a year, life is going to be pretty miserable, and for most folks (including me) totally not worth it. The point though is that being a perma-counsel (or non-equity partner at a lower ranked biglaw firm) is a pretty comfortable and steady path to making $500k+/year for a regular full-time job, billing 1800-2000 hours, with reasonable control over your lifestyle. That puts you in the top 1% of incomes, and makes the opportunity cost of law school (including student loans) worth it.

Flippantly giving that up because you think that role is the same as being a miserable and overworked second year associate is pretty wacky, and shows a lack of understanding of how biglaw improves as you get more senior (assuming you aren't gunning for partner). Now look, some people are just not cut out from biglaw (not detail oriented, lack of interest in how business deals work, inability to meet deadlines, etc...), but if you are reasonably good at the job, and are willing to stick it out during the painful junior years, there are a lot of reasonable private practice $500k/year jobs out there that are definitely non-miserable (go browse through the websites of v20 firms and see how many counsels there are these days).

Perfectly fine if you just don't care about money at all and want to be an AUSA or whatever, but any decision to leave biglaw at such a junior level, without another high comp role lined up, definitely needs to take into account the long-term financial consequences of that decision.

[Anonymous User]

How likely is it to get a perma-counsel position that you can just chill in indefinitely? It keeps being proffered as the best option here but if it were that straightforward, why wouldn’t everyone do this?

Also, I’m not sure why the opportunity cost of law school is being raised so consistently. Most people attending law school wouldn’t have made vast sums of money in those three years if they hadn’t gone to law school. If the assumption is that everyone left a lucrative consulting or IB gig to go to law school, maybe, but that doesn’t describe most law students.

[jotarokujo]

Flippantly giving that up because you think that role is the same as being a miserable and overworked second year associate is pretty wacky, and shows a lack of understanding of how biglaw improves as you get more senior (assuming you aren't gunning for partner). Now look, some people are just not cut out from biglaw (not detail oriented, lack of interest in how business deals work, inability to meet deadlines, etc...), but if you are reasonably good at the job, and are willing to stick it out during the painful junior years, there are a lot of reasonable private practice $500k/year jobs out there that are definitely non-miserable (go browse through the websites of v20 firms and see how many counsels there are these days).

Perfectly fine if you just don't care about money at all and want to be an AUSA or whatever, but any decision to leave biglaw at such a junior level, without another high comp role lined up, definitely needs to take into account the long-term financial consequences of that decision.

monetarily, law school is not the highest expected value path period (unless you equity partner or you somehow can get into a t-14 without being able to do finance, sales, accounting, engineering, quant, or tech etc out of undergrad). taking into account the opportunity cost is pointless when the only way law school is rational is because one chooses to sacrifice money for substantive interest

[Anonymous User]

How likely is it to get a perma-counsel position that you can just chill in indefinitely? It keeps being proffered as the best option here but if it were that straightforward, why wouldn’t everyone do this?

Also, I’m not sure why the opportunity cost of law school is being raised so consistently. Most people attending law school wouldn’t have made vast sums of money in those three years if they hadn’t gone to law school. If the assumption is that everyone left a lucrative consulting or IB gig to go to law school, maybe, but that doesn’t describe most law students.

I actually think this is the most likely career outcome for relatively smart lawyers, in private practice, who are unwilling to deal with the stress of being a biglaw partner and who don't have a significant book. You end up in a non-equity partner/counsel role in amlaw 200, or in reasonable sized midlaw, work full time and make your $400-600k (maybe less in small markets), and are generally just another regular upper-middle class professional. Amusingly, most people in biglaw are too ambitious for these type of jobs, as they are looking to make $1 million plus, and if Paul Weiss or whatever tells them as a 9th year associate "you are never making partner but are welcome to stay around forever as a counsel with normal hours," these people rapidly look to lateral out to another firm or go in house, because long term biglaw at under $1 million per year is a failure for them.

Note, that perma-counsel isn't "chill," it is a normal full-time job billing 1800-2000 hours a year, and you will need to work late into the night at times, and on weekends as well. So definitely legitimate work, but not the craziness and health issues of equity partnership, or the misery of billing 2400 hours as a second year associate. As far as opportunity cost, most people who can get biglaw could have been a reasonably successful doctor/accountant/consultant/whatever, and topping out at $175k is much lower than what a doctor in private practice tops out at, or even an accountant at a reasonable sized firm. It is just a really bad financial outcome, all things considered, and strongly suggests that if your goal is to maximize lifetime earnings at a given level of work-life balance, you should have done something else. Now again, some people are indifferent to money, in which case being an AUSA could make a lot of sense if you like the gig, but just bailing on biglaw as a second year with nothing else reasonable lined up can end up being a super-painful long term financial decision.

[Anonymous User]

Anyway, anyone who has actually left biglaw as a junior want to share where they’re at and whether they’re enjoying it instead of unsolicited financial advice? Public interest perspectives would be great.

[Anonymous User]

Title says most of it. For those of you who left in years 2-4, what are you up to now? Do you enjoy it? Do you regret it? Feeling incredibly burnt out and only figured I’d last a few years anyway.

Went in house as a third year at an F100 tech co with 270k all in comp (210 base, 30 bonus, 30 RSU/year). Don’t mean to brag or be an ass, just want to put figures out there for other juniors looking to leave.

I enjoyed Biglaw but it was always a means to an end to land exactly this type of job. I’m still somewhat shocked that it worked out like it did but every once in awhile life throws you a win.

[Barry grandpapy]

Title says most of it. For those of you who left in years 2-4, what are you up to now? Do you enjoy it? Do you regret it? Feeling incredibly burnt out and only figured I’d last a few years anyway.

Went in house as a third year at an F100 tech co with 270k all in comp (210 base, 30 bonus, 30 RSU/year). Don’t mean to brag or be an ass, just want to put figures out there for other juniors looking to leave.

I enjoyed Biglaw but it was always a means to an end to land exactly this type of job. I’m still somewhat shocked that it worked out like it did but every once in awhile life throws you a win.

Any chance you can give some detail on typical hours/weekend/late night work (if any)?

[Anonymous User]

Left biglaw as a 7th year. 205k base, 225k all in comp. Work literally like 10 hours a week, maybe less, and my health insurance is 100x better and 401k is matched. Have never answered an email after 6pm or on weekends. Have never received a question or request that required a response more urgently than like 24h.

My friends I left behind are now mostly permacounsel and make more than double what I make. I need to worry about money (like I took a one week vacation to Hawaii instead of a 2 week vacation recently, oh no). This is truly the best decision I ever made. My friends are often happy too, I think, but they often still complain about work and stress whereas I never do. But they think it was worth it — kind of a self selection thing?

(I wouldn’t have got this job if I had left as a junior. I worry about retirement more than I otherwise would have, but I feel like it will be fine. Live in Manhattan fwiw, but considering moving to Jersey).

[nealric]

How likely is it to get a perma-counsel position that you can just grind in indefinitely? It keeps being proffered as the best option here but if it were that straightforward, why wouldn’t everyone do this?

Fixed it for you.