Whether you're paid Cravath or not depends on whether you're NY-qualified, and whether you're liked by your boss at the firm.

In any event, note that many White Shoe firms in Singapore are bankrolled by their US head offices or highly levered, which is how they can afford paying Cravath-scale salaries to their lawyers. It's rare to find Asian clients in this part of the world who are willing to cough up fees determined based on US rates.

Local firms, on the other hand, are dirt-cheap in terms of fees compared to their foreign counterparts and are not so heavily dependent on bank borrowing, which is why they pay their lawyers so little.