Lawyer Salary

Originally Posted by Unregistered

If corp generally pays more, what's the point of going into disputes then even if you are super good at the law?

i don't have the statistics but my feel is that there's generally more litigation/general solicitor jobs (e.g. your average Chinatown/boutique firm) out there compared to pure corporate law gigs (e.g. your average big law firm, and even then there's really only a couple of local law firms that dominate).

also, believe it or not there are quite a number of disputes lawyers who really enjoy doing disputes work and can't imagine doing anything else. Perhaps it might be a lack of imagination, but hey far be it from me to say.

Originally Posted by Unregistered

i don't have the statistics but my feel is that there's generally more litigation/general solicitor jobs (e.g. your average Chinatown/boutique firm) out there compared to pure corporate law gigs (e.g. your average big law firm, and even then there's really only a couple of local law firms that dominate).

also, believe it or not there are quite a number of disputes lawyers who really enjoy doing disputes work and can't imagine doing anything else. Perhaps it might be a lack of imagination, but hey far be it from me to say.

this goes without saying.

One should not forget also that some corporate work, to an extent, can be taken inhouse and kept there. Which reduces the volume of work available for external corp counsel.

You seldom see companies except the largest corporations with dedicated inhouse disputes teams. Even then, these guys cannot or wouldn't represent the company in actual court proceedings or arbi proceedings and need external disputes counsel.

Originally Posted by Unregistered

Didn't he put the pay at 6.5k for NQs, pretty good for a small firm tbh.

It’s a red flag tbh. Look at how high the turnover of their assocs is (none of the ppl on the firm’s “About” page are still with the firm. Read their glassdoor too. Clearly pay is not keeping them.

Hi anyone knows if the B4 will advertise their vacancy for NQ on mycareersfuture? Had been monitoring that page for a couple of months and only saw small medium firm publishing vacancies.....offering salary ~4.5k. Pathetic

Originally Posted by Unregistered

Hi anyone knows if the B4 will advertise their vacancy for NQ on mycareersfuture? Had been monitoring that page for a couple of months and only saw small medium firm publishing vacancies.....offering salary ~4.5k. Pathetic

B4 have enough trainees every year.
Unless you are JLC or publishing non-stop

Originally Posted by Unregistered

Hi anyone knows if the B4 will advertise their vacancy for NQ on mycareersfuture? Had been monitoring that page for a couple of months and only saw small medium firm publishing vacancies.....offering salary ~4.5k. Pathetic

The b4 firms have advertised vacancies on mycareerfuture and lawsoccareers so many times in the past year (it's averaging at least 1-2 b4 posting per month).

How have you missed it? Btw they don't call for NQs in general, just apply to the 1PQE roles, since if you were called in Aug 2021, you start being 1PQE in Jan 2022.

Originally Posted by Unregistered

Junior lawyers are leaving practice not because of their lack of grit, the poor work life balance, or unreasonable clients or bosses. People who phrase the issue as such are missing the other side of the equation.

The reality is each generation of lawyers has to work harder, for much longer, for a smaller share of the pie. Let me explain what I mean.

Michael Hwang SC described his experience as a junior lawyer back in 1968 as follows: “Courier services had not yet started operations, and overseas telephone calls were pretty expensive by today’s standards, so everything proceeded at a certain pace, especially if there was correspondence with someone overseas. Working life was therefore somewhat leisurely, which meant that working late was not usually required. I was therefore able to enjoy a reasonable social life after work, although much of that time was spent by me in teaching part time at the Law School.”

Ever since Michael Hwang SC's time, we have seen lots of technological advances. It is well documented that working hours have increased across industries generally and in the legal industry in particular. The first iPhone was only introduced 14 years ago. Prior to that it was easier to disconnect from work.

It is recently quite common recently to see LinkedIn posts about senior lawyers having to "work hard too". Unfortunately people seem to overlook the fact that, by design or otherwise, junior lawyers are now expected to work harder with fewer quality breaks because it is now harder to disconnect from work. It is well documented in Singapore and overseas that the actual time billed by lawyers has been increasing year after year.

It is also worth noting that when senior lawyers had to work hard in the past, they did so in a context where there was a clear path to partnership. Or they were already partners! By that I mean real partners. A quick review of the CV of any senior lawyer will show you how early those senior lawyers made partner. Working hard in that context means putting money directly into your pockets. Working hard in today's context means putting money into other people's pockets.

Unfortunately, people seem to again conveniently overlook the fact that the work/reward ratio of working hard as a 6 PQE partner or a 4 PQE soon-to-be partner is different from a 4 PQE associate.

On this note, it now takes a junior lawyer much longer to reach (real) partnership level, and even after slogging for a long time, the prospects of making partner are no longer clear. Tell any junior lawyer that if they work hard for 6 years, they will get the chance to flip a coin, and if the coin lands on head, they will definitely become an equity partner. I can assure you that the attrition rate would definitely slow down. The reality however is that the chances of making (real) partner seem to be worse than a coin flip. This is also well documented.

So, not only do junior lawyers have to work hard for much longer, they are also paid terribly in relative terms. 20 years ago, pupils had to serve 6 months of pupillage and received $2,000 in pupil's allowance. The median wage then was about $2,000. Soon, trainees will be required to serve a training contract of 1 year and there is no news as to whether the prevailing market trainee allowance of $2,000 will be revised upwards. The median wage today is $4,500. People who were formerly trainees and now partners are wilfully blind to this fact.

In short, the story of a junior lawyer in a local firm is this.

As a trainee, the soon-to-be junior lawyer has to receive more than half of what their partners used to receive and train for twice as long. After the junior lawyer gets called, they have to work much harder in terms of volume and intensity compared to what their partners used to do as junior lawyers. The junior lawyer also has much less breaks compared to what their partners used to have. And the junior lawyer would have to slog for a much longer time before they get a chance of making (salaried) partner.

This is in a context where opportunities are aplenty for a young and smart person.

No wonder people are leaving. It is not because they cannot take the hard work or the toxic culture. It is because it is not worth it.

Thank you for posting this. It now makes so much sense that older lawyers are very passionate about the law and their careers. I guess when the rewards are well worth your efforts, it is much easier to stay passionate.

I have attended several recruitment talks where older lawyers would say that it is a "calling" and young people need to have "passion".

If one is cynical, one might say that the vague words like "calling" and "passion" are just another way of hoodwinking bright-eyed graduates because law firms have nothing else to offer. Exploitative and penny pinching practices, poor salary and allowance compared to the past, international firms, other sectors like tech and finance, and soul sucking hours with no breaks. Passion solves everything when we can't treat you right!

Originally Posted by Unregistered

Thank you for posting this. It now makes so much sense that older lawyers are very passionate about the law and their careers. I guess when the rewards are well worth your efforts, it is much easier to stay passionate.

I have attended several recruitment talks where older lawyers would say that it is a "calling" and young people need to have "passion".

If one is cynical, one might say that the vague words like "calling" and "passion" are just another way of hoodwinking bright-eyed graduates because law firms have nothing else to offer. Exploitative and penny pinching practices, poor salary and allowance compared to the past, international firms, other sectors like tech and finance, and soul sucking hours with no breaks. Passion solves everything when we can't treat you right!

They are just gaslighting you. It is not a problem with the profession or firm, instead it is a problem with you and your lack of passion/grit and your love for things outside of law such as a husband/wife, children and side hustles.

Escaping the drudgery of lawyering. I somehow regret taking my LLB. LLB degree limits my career options, unlike other BA, BSc degrees. The first thing my employer asked is why I even bother to do an LLB if i don't wanna do law. This is when I realised I needed to begin from square one. Even if you try legal tech, you also no experience in sales, marketing, operation. Zero programming skills too. Now I felt pathetic and stuck

Originally Posted by Unregistered

Escaping the drudgery of lawyering. I somehow regret taking my LLB. LLB degree limits my career options, unlike other BA, BSc degrees. The first thing my employer asked is why I even bother to do an LLB if i don't wanna do law. This is when I realised I needed to begin from square one. Even if you try legal tech, you also no experience in sales, marketing, operation. Zero programming skills too. Now I felt pathetic and stuck

The best part of this post is that BA, BSc doesn't limit your career options - LOL. Try job hunting having a generic bachelors, seriously. It is NO better than your LLB and most likely worse