Big Law Pay Hikes May Hurt Firms’ Diversity Efforts

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Publish Date:
August 3, 2016
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Bloomberg
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Summary

Many lawyers are celebrating the new large law firm pay scale, but the pay raises could have a negative effect on law firms’ efforts to attract and retain diverse attorneys.

More than 110 large law firms have raised associate salaries since the beginning of June, with first year associates making $180,000 annually at most of the firms adopting raises.

“There’s no free lunch,” Deborah Rhode, a professor at Stanford Law School, told Bloomberg BNA.

Rhode’s expertise includes race and ethnicity discrimination and she has written extensively on equality in the legal profession.

The result is “to put increasing pressure on billable hours,” Rhode said.

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