To think that no newly qualified lawyer can be worth a salary of £150k?

[Molemole]

I’m a private practise solicitor in the south west. I serve my community and have worked my way up to partner in our small firm. Aged 56 I make £60k a year.

I’ve just read that lawyers at snobby london firms like Freshfields and Linklaters are now paying their trainees more than me. They are paying newly qualified lawyers £150k plus bonus.

How can anyone be worth that with 6 months experience in that area?

I’m not high worth in my job the same way some of my university classmates were. One of them took a job after uni that had a very high salary and a guaranteed 250k golden handshake after 4 years, that was well over twenty years ago so life changing money at the time. Some of them had serious potential and are now on serious remuneration that reflects their value to their work organisation. I’m paid well but not at those levels because frankly I didn’t have their potential.

Hard for me to explain why, without being outing, but I have worked with many trainee solicitors at corporate firms. I regularly interact with senior lawyers at them too and am friends with several (from attending law school together.)

It depends a bit on what one considers “worth”. NQ solicitors in those firms have fees targets which are approx 3 times their salary - something that can be achieved given the high rate at which their work is billed to their corporate clients. Those firms are ruthlessly profit driven. They will be keeping an eye on the future profitability of those solicitors - so even if they aren’t making huge amounts of money for the firm to start, the firm will be willing to pay high salaries for the profit they can make off them later as a way to attract and retain them.

The work at such firms tends to be done in teams on one or two large cases at most and there is a lot of boring but chargeable admin work which has to be done by someone and usually falls to trainees and NQs. They are pushed to do it for long hours to meet their targets.

At the junior end the solicitors don’t do what I consider “law” as there is very little advising, very little significant drafting, very little thinking through cases etc. It’s basically well paid donkey work and frankly, it may make them a lot of money but I would find it boring.

Ignore the posters on here who seem to think that such lawyers are cleverer than local solicitors. They’re often not. Being very clever doesn’t mean you will go to those firms - not everyone is motivated by cash. And those outside the profession know nothing about the hours of legal aid lawyers so ignore them too. We often work similar hours but for less financial reward.

I do something very particular and am well known (in my field) for what I do - so much so that I have been head-hunted by bigger firms who act for the defendants. I’d hate it. Like you, I do a job that serves a particular client group. I make a huge difference to individual lives, helping people who need help but can’t afford it. The public law cases I do have wider impact too, which is worth more than money to me.

If you want to switch to corporate law you probably can. But why would you want to?!

Their employers consider them worth it. Not sure why anything else matters.

God, that was an essay. Sorry! I just typed without thinking!

They're probably working twice as many hours as you, after tax probably getting about twice as much net pay, and given London weighting probably earning two and a half times as much in billable hours for their employers. Seems fair enough.

I still quite literally have nightmares that I’m still working there.

Snobby is a rather odd word to use?

I'm surprised at your income, it seems really very low!

If you're a 56 year old solicitor and it's only just come to your attention that magic circle firms pay NQs high salaries, you must have been living under a rock.

They pay those salaries because their clients are FTSE 100 companies who go to magic circle and US firms in order to be able to say that they have had the best advice on their multi million pound transactions. The fees charged enable the firms to pay the best lawyers high salaries. Those juniors work extremely long hours for the privilege of the salary.

Just as in any other profession, there is a spectrum of service providers at different price points and the most expensive ones pay their people more than the cheap ones, to attract the best talent.

Also, it's private practice. Practise is a verb. That's the sort of error you wouldn't find a magic circle lawyer making. And no, I don't work for a magic circle firm.

Based on the actual hours they do it's around 40 an hour pay. They charge out significantly more than 40 an hour, so they are definitely worth it to the company.
For me 40 an hour isn't worth work being my life, but for some it is. But 60k at partnership is seriously under paid. Does your company not make any money

I know a retired corporate lawyer, this is in America though and not London. He had zero life at all for a long time. He retired at 50 as a multi millionaire he took that decision because so many of his colleagues were dying of heart attacks in their early fifties after years of sleep deprivation, he often slept at work.

He is actually a nice guy but a couple of lawyers I have met were absolute dicks.

DH did his PhD at Cambridge and is a University Professor some of his friends are in investment banking and law. They earn probably at least x3 what he does a year . He is just far too nice for the corporate cut throat world. That’s what also counts is what is your personality like, this can’t be changed really. You are born with traits and then you pick up behaviours as a child, often learned from parents. Another of his friends stayed in academia, he is my preferred dinner guest out of the lot of them. He is just a better human.

It's a little bit like why top tier footballers and actors earn huge salaries - the industry makes huge profits off the back of their work.

I have friends who trained at the big firms (albeit 15 years ago). Their training salary was more than double of mine, I was quite resentful at the time as I worked late a lot and had a huge caseload but I remember going for dinner with one friend after work and she then went back to work at 9.00pm. She left at 2 pqe as she couldn't hack the hours and pace anymore.

I now earn £50k, I'm 15 pqe. Crap salary really for my level and for the SE but I have a nice life. Wfh when I want, rarely work later than 5pm. I don't have to make up time for school/medical appointments. Targets are realistic and my employer takes into account annual leave/slow periods if targets aren't hit. I can turn down new clients if I'm too busy. I'd much rather this life than a magic circle life.

I don’t know where your friend works, but I would not work 12 hours a day for £80k.

Definitely sounds like is selling herself short.

I’ve got to a position where I’m working 40-45 hours a week for considerably more than that, but I am 10 years into my career. How old is your friend?

They're worth whatever a law firm is prepared to pay them, OP.

It's a simple case of supply and demand.

If there are clients willing to pay hundreds of pounds per hour for a newly qualified solicitor, and newly qualified solicitors willing to work crazy hours to bill as much as possible, paying those kinds of astronomical salaries is profitable for the partners.

You're a partner in a law firm, you know how the business model works.

Clearly no twentysomething is going to want to work those kinds of hours and sacrifice their personal life for a salary of £60k.

If you'd been able and willing to move to London as a junior lawyer and work for a firm like that, you too could have been paid such a salary (or its equivalent at the time you qualified).

You chose not to, and your life has been different as a result.

For what it's worth, I don't envy them. You're only young once and I think they are wasting their youth and will find themselves on the wrong side of 35 with a serious case of the gilded handcuffs.

But you are being unreasonable to say they are not worth what they are being paid. If they weren't worth that much in the London employment market, they wouldn't be getting paid that much.

My friend worked for a magic circle firm. For years and years he would call his wife to say goodnight at 9.30. He didn't make it back for bedtime let alone tea time. He would often have to work on Saturday too. He considered it worth it because he was very ambitious and they do have a comfortable life. I doubt he was paid that much an hour for a long time to be honest.

Another friend works for a highly respected law firm close to London and does a four day week. Senior partner, home for tea. Also comfortable but not as comfortable. His wage rose gradually. He been offered city jobs but work/life balance is more important to him.

People aren’t generally “worth” what they are paid though.

Freshfields etc trainers and new lawyers always made silly money - not quite that silly in my day but still silly.

For that money, they are expected to have no life whatsoever during their trainee years. To work whatever hours are demanded and do so enthusiastically. It wasn’t ever going to be my cup of tea so I didn’t do it.

I'd say in big law firms the link between what you're worth and what you're paid is uniquely close because of the focus on the ratio between billable hours and salaries.

I always get confused with practise and practice.

So practice is the noun, and practise is the verb?
So you practise law, and work in a private practice, is that it?

It wouldn’t surprise me, but the workload is massive. You give your life over to the firm.

I had a friend who worked for a similar firm when we were in our 20s and, after a night out, she got the taxi to drop her off at work (it was maybe midnight?) because her colleagues were still there and there was stuff still to do.

Yep.

Thanks.

And now I’ve said it to myself so much it sounds meaningless!

They are paying to own you. Yes it is a lot of money but I imagine a miserable life unless you are very driven and reslient and work is the main thing you are interested in.

I used to work for a public body that employed a lot of ex magic circle grads. They were bright and capable but many of them were emotionally broken and had a really fucked up relationship with work.

It was not unusual for them to talk about the various breakdowns they had had and the life events missed for work (one colleague missed her own engagement party) . Yes I have earnt a lot less over my career so far (mainly public and third sector) but you know what? I spent my twenties gaining experiences and forging life long friendships and have pretty decent mental and physical health - that is worth more to me than a £150k starting salary

@Molemole it's not much fun though and they don't go home at 5pm. They have a very high burnout rate. Few make it to 56 and still working in that environment, and those that do may have sacrificed a great deal of their life opportunity to get there (eg family, parenting, friends, hobbies). It's just a money machine for everyone, but there's more to life than that. I wouldn't let it get you down if you've enjoyed your career and served your clients well. I'm 43 and realised a few years ago that my biggest mistake in my 20s and 30s was taking it all too seriously. Ambition in big law often shades into mania. I earn less in the regions than colleagues in London, but I made my choice and still do pretty well.

I'm struggling to believe you are who you say you are.

(Am a solicitor in the regions, never wanted the Magic Circle lifestyle)

They'll be working a lot of hours, with a lot of pressure.

A friend of mine worked for one - great salary, but she developed a painkiller addiction and self harmed.
She quit, left working in law completely, left London and is much happier.