{"id":120720,"date":"2025-05-28T18:02:38","date_gmt":"2025-05-29T02:02:38","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/xira.com\/p\/2025\/05\/28\/sorry-associates-but-now-theres-less-pressure-to-increase-biglaws-225k-salary-scale\/"},"modified":"2025-05-28T18:02:38","modified_gmt":"2025-05-29T02:02:38","slug":"sorry-associates-but-now-theres-less-pressure-to-increase-biglaws-225k-salary-scale","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/xira.com\/p\/2025\/05\/28\/sorry-associates-but-now-theres-less-pressure-to-increase-biglaws-225k-salary-scale\/","title":{"rendered":"Sorry, Associates, But Now There\u2019s \u2018Less Pressure\u2019 To Increase Biglaw\u2019s $225K Salary Scale"},"content":{"rendered":"

Ed. note<\/u>: Welcome to our daily feature, Quote of the Day<\/a>.<\/em><\/p>\n

Without the stiff competition of the talent wars to push it along, the market is not moving as quickly to follow the few big firms who have announced first-year pay increases as we saw in the last cycle.<\/strong><\/p>\n

\u2014 Nikia Gray, executive director of the National Association for Law Placement (NALP), commenting on the organization\u2019s latest salary report<\/a>, which revealed that as of January 1, 2025, the median base salary for first-year associates was $200,000, rising to $215,000 at firms with more than 700 lawyers. \u201cMost notably, while some firms are now offering an eye-popping $225,000 entry-level salary<\/a>, the overall median first-year salary and the median first-year salary at the largest firms remained flat compared to the figures NALP reported in 2023,\u201d she said, \u201cindicating that the market softened over the last two years and there is less pressure on firms to increase salaries in order to remain competitive.\u201d<\/em><\/strong> NALP\u2019s report notes that just 32% of all law firms offer $225K to first-year associates, but that rate grew to 45% among law firms with more than 700 lawyers. <\/em><\/strong><\/p>\n

\n
\"Staci
<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n

Staci Zaretsky<\/a>\u00a0is a senior editor at Above the Law, where she\u2019s worked since 2011. She\u2019d love to hear from you, so please feel free to email<\/a> her with any tips, questions, comments, or critiques. You can follow her on\u00a0Bluesky<\/a>,\u00a0X\/Twitter<\/a>, and\u00a0Threads<\/a>,\u00a0or connect with her on\u00a0LinkedIn<\/a>.<\/em><\/strong><\/p>\n

The post Sorry, Associates, But Now There\u2019s \u2018Less Pressure\u2019 To Increase Biglaw\u2019s $225K Salary Scale<\/a> appeared first on Above the Law<\/a>.<\/p>\n

\"\"<\/figure>\n

Ed. note<\/u>: Welcome to our daily feature, Quote of the Day<\/a>.<\/em><\/p>\n

Without the stiff competition of the talent wars to push it along, the market is not moving as quickly to follow the few big firms who have announced first-year pay increases as we saw in the last cycle.<\/strong><\/p>\n

\u2014 Nikia Gray, executive director of the National Association for Law Placement (NALP), commenting on the organization\u2019s latest salary report<\/a>, which revealed that as of January 1, 2025, the median base salary for first-year associates was $200,000, rising to $215,000 at firms with more than 700 lawyers. \u201cMost notably, while some firms are now offering an eye-popping $225,000 entry-level salary<\/a>, the overall median first-year salary and the median first-year salary at the largest firms remained flat compared to the figures NALP reported in 2023,\u201d she said, \u201cindicating that the market softened over the last two years and there is less pressure on firms to increase salaries in order to remain competitive.\u201d<\/em><\/strong> NALP\u2019s report notes that just 32% of all law firms offer $225K to first-year associates, but that rate grew to 45% among law firms with more than 700 lawyers. <\/em><\/strong><\/p>\n

\n
\"Staci
<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n

Staci Zaretsky<\/a>\u00a0is a senior editor at Above the Law, where she\u2019s worked since 2011. She\u2019d love to hear from you, so please feel free to email<\/a> her with any tips, questions, comments, or critiques. You can follow her on\u00a0Bluesky<\/a>,\u00a0X\/Twitter<\/a>, and\u00a0Threads<\/a>,\u00a0or connect with her on\u00a0LinkedIn<\/a>.<\/em><\/strong><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Ed. note: Welcome to our daily feature, Quote of the Day. Without the stiff competition of the talent wars to push it along, the market is not moving as quickly to follow the few big firms who have announced first-year pay increases as we saw in the last cycle. \u2014 Nikia Gray, executive director of […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":3,"featured_media":120691,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_et_pb_use_builder":"","_et_pb_old_content":"","_et_gb_content_width":"","_jetpack_memberships_contains_paid_content":false,"footnotes":""},"categories":[16],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-120720","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-above_the_law"],"jetpack_featured_media_url":"https:\/\/i0.wp.com\/xira.com\/p\/wp-content\/uploads\/2025\/05\/Staci-Zaretsky-b2MVMQ.jpeg?fit=150%2C100&ssl=1","jetpack_sharing_enabled":true,"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/xira.com\/p\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/120720","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/xira.com\/p\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/xira.com\/p\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/xira.com\/p\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/3"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/xira.com\/p\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=120720"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/xira.com\/p\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/120720\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/xira.com\/p\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/120691"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/xira.com\/p\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=120720"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/xira.com\/p\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=120720"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/xira.com\/p\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=120720"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}