Women Lawyers at the Top Earn Significantly Less than Men

Lawyer Pay

Women Lawyers at the Top Earn Significantly Less than Men

Posted Nov 29, 2007, 07:34 am CDT

By Debra Cassens Weiss

A new survey shows “slow progress” for women in the upper echelons of big law firms.

The survey (PDF) by the National Association of Women Lawyers finds that only 16 percent of equity partners at large law firms are women, and they earn almost $90,000 less than their male counterparts, a salary disparity that increased from a year ago.

Male equity partners earn a median salary of $625,000 and females $537,000, the Legal Intelligencer reports. The survey says at least part of the difference may be because of the substantially greater number of male equity partners.

The pay difference is even greater at firms with higher billable-hour requirements, where female equity partners earn $140,000 less than males.

Salary differences continue at other levels, though they are not as pronounced. Female of counsels earn $20,000 less than males (with median compensation of $188,000 and $208,000 respectively), and female nonequity partners earn $27,000 less (with median compensation of $236,000 and $263,000 respectively).

Women hold 30 percent of the of counsel positions and 26 percent of nonequity partnerships.

Bobbi Liebenberg, chair of the Philadelphia Bar Association's Women in the Profession Committee, told the Intelligencer she found the low number of women equity partners to be troubling and the pay disparity “unsettling.”

She said there is a growing trend of women lawyers over the age of 50 leaving the profession and more women opting for flextime schedules. Those who stay may be relegated to nonequity tiers because they chose flexible options, she said.

The survey was sent to 200 of the nation’s largest law firms, and 112 responded. Only 55 firms offered compensation information.

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Posted by Wolfgang - 10 months, 1 week, 5 days, 2 hours, 50 minutes ago

Maybe the actuality is that women attorneys are less willing to put up with the billable-hour assininity which is currently governing law firm practice. If so, they should be commended, not criticized by the hardline feminists or pities. Why commended? Because they evidently are more willing to insist that law BE a profession rather than a glorified factory assembly line where those in law firms are nothing more than indentured servants with a professional license.
Posted by Donald C. Nord - 10 months, 1 week, 5 days, 1 hour, 56 minutes ago

It would be very interesting to see a further refinement of the suvey which showed female equity partners with median earnings about 15% less than male equity partners--the refinement to eliminate from the statistics the necessary number of males or females in each age bracket so to attain approximately the same proportions of seniority among each group (males and females). I would expect that there is a greater proportion of males among the most senior equity partners and a greater proportion of females among the more junior equity partners and that this may entirely explain the salary differences. It is my observation that very few female law students graduated in the 1960s (now most senior) while a great proportion of law students are currently female. The more senior equity partners can usually be expected to attain higher compensation than the most junior equity partners.
Posted by Fred - 10 months, 1 week, 5 days, 1 hour, 29 minutes ago

There are good reasons for the discrepancy, which are not accounted for by the mere statistics. I know of a firm in Chicago where none of the female partners, department heads or management committee members have books of business above the low five (5) digit level (and some none at all), while their male counterparts are held to the market standard on rainmaking. Let’s see a survey on pay parity between equals.
Posted by pat - 10 months, 1 week, 4 days, 7 hours, 14 minutes ago

There are also BAD reasons for this. THe glass ceiling is real and astonishingly persistent.
Posted by M Evans - 10 months, 1 week, 4 days, 6 hours, 53 minutes ago

Good point, Fred - only have you considered that the reason many women don’t have the same books of business may be the same reason underlying the pay/promotion discrepancy? Male lawyers have a much easier time generating business in many cases, because the (male) senior partners are taking them on their client lunches and golf outings and helping them nurture their networking skills. It’s a self-perpetuating cycle - women don’t choose to have fewer clients, we just often have a harder time busting through the barriers to get them.
Posted by J Woods - 10 months, 1 week, 4 days, 5 hours, 28 minutes ago

I don’t want to say that there is no gender discrimination in the field, there most certainly is, to some degree. However, in many cases of pay disparity the underlying cause is the very biological difference men and women have. Women are much more likely to take off for child bearing or child care. Further, there is a lot evidence that indicates that in these large firms the women attorneys are taking the flexible options instead of billing the 60 hour work weeks. They want to be able to spend time raising their children. There’s nothing wrong with that; if daddy is an attorney and mommy is an attorney and they both bill 50-60 hours a week, who raises the child? The gender inequality arises from the fact that firms don’t realize/care that somebody had to be able to raise the child and they give two very distinct options: a lot of billable hours for higher pay, or a flexible program with fewer billable hours but much less pay. Maybe, again, the billable hour needs to go by the wayside and pay should be based on quality and type of work rather than number of hours. How strange is it that some of the poorest workers in the U.S. and some of the wealthiest workers are, in effect, just wage earners?
Posted by Jenny - 10 months, 1 week, 4 days, 5 hours, 16 minutes ago

I’d like to see a survey broken down by seniority and revenue generation, meting out anyone on reduced work schedules, which should address the above protestations. I also would be interested in a breakdown by practice area. I think it’s hard to get realistic numbers without taking all of this into consideration.
Posted by Michelle - 10 months, 1 week, 4 days, 4 hours, 8 minutes ago

I left an equity partnership to start a solo practice. As a solo I have become a good rainmaker. In my former firm, however, I was essentially discouraged from rainmaking because there was more than enough work to go around generated by the reputations of my more senior partners. I was valued, as are many women, for working cases, dealing with staff issues and keeping clients happy. Unfortunately, although those roles are essential to the success of any law firm, they are not given the same recognition, financially or otherwise, as bringing in new business. If this were to change I believe you would see higher salaries for women partners.
Posted by Ellen Hanson - 10 months, 1 week, 4 days, 3 hours, 31 minutes ago

I am in a two person partnership and the situation described does not apply to me. I was able to raise three children in a semi normal fashion and be a lawyer at the same time.. My practice did not flourish during that time period and now it does. I am now a major rainmaker for my law firm. I do not see the profession as being inately biased. I see woman as having the necessity and desire to be caretakers of children and elderly parents. As long as that is considered a blessing there will be a financial impact on the earnings of the caretaker. To my surprise most of my women classmates from the 60’s wanted to be the caretakers and were pleased to be in a profession where there were so many alternative ways of compromising to fulfill both dreams. I believe the practice of law offers a lot of opportunities for alternative solutions for women. Women should be grateful we are not men and can define our success as we chose.
Posted by MIchaela - 10 months, 1 week, 4 days, 3 hours, 13 minutes ago

The fact a woman might take more time “off” or bill less because she chooses to have children is not the only reason women are paid less. I as well as several other female lawyers I know have chosen to not have children in hopes we would be able to go further in our careers, and yet we still make less money than our male counterparts with children.
Posted by Cole - 10 months, 1 week, 4 days, 2 hours, 37 minutes ago

I agree with J.Wood’s statement (#6), “Maybe, again, the billable hour needs to go by the wayside and pay should be based on quality and type of work rather than number of hours. How strange is it that some of the poorest workers in the U.S. and some of the wealthiest workers are, in effect, just wage earners?” This is really what is so archaic about the legal profession that holds back both genders and the industry in general.
Posted by Sandra - 10 months, 1 week, 4 days, 2 hours, 17 minutes ago

It would be nice to believe that in the future perhaps men would take on more “flexible” schedules to participate more in raising their children. The benefit would be amazing: 1) the phenomena of less pay would not be the “mommy” track but the “parent” track, 2) the culture of truly supporting “family values” would be actual practice in law firms and not simply an intangible, political philosphy, and 3) hopefully salaries would become more equal over time. Not to mention, the benefit to children of having their overworked, stressed-out father be present and less stresed out. And also, relieving mom of some of the pressure that comes from trying to succeed in her career and performing most of the childcare. The decision to “take time off” and raise children is not a biological decision, it is an intellectual one. (I also agree with Wolfgang’s comment #1)
Posted by CTV - 10 months, 1 week, 3 days, 22 hours, 51 minutes ago

There is a certain level of irony. Back when I was a law clerk, I worked with a guy who was married and had kids. Although we both worked as hard as the other, and both turned out high quality work (although some would even say mine was better, but I digress), I later learned that he made more than I did. It was simply because he had kids. In the male partners’ minds, he had a family to support so he should make more money; the fact that I chose to go to law school before undertaking the financial obligations of parenthood was of no consequence. Mycompensation wasn’t based on whether I worked as hard or turned out as high quality a product as him; as a man, he was supposed to be the breadwinner and so he was compensated accordingly. Since I wasn’t a “breadwinner,” why should they pay me as much as they paid him if I would (unknowingly) work for less? It was a no-win situation.
Posted by Anon - 10 months, 1 week, 3 days, 22 hours, 15 minutes ago

The data referenced in this article are oversimplified. Status as equity partner, counsel, associate, etc., is not a sufficient basis for salary comparison, although it is one factor. Let’s look at all the factors that are statistically relevant: seniority, part-time/full-time status, book of business, and so forth. Articles such as this one that rely on incomplete or meaningless data to make sweeping assertions about disparity in pay between the sexes (or with respect to any other criterion that should be irrelevant to pay) do not advance the discussion in ways that can address concrete, rather than perceived, problems. If the specific problems are not identified, the appropriate solutions will not be developed.
Posted by dpelf - 10 months, 1 week, 3 days, 21 hours, 35 minutes ago

Sandra hits the nail on the head.
Posted by Mike Hunt - 10 months, 1 week, 3 days, 18 hours, 25 minutes ago

Im sick of this tripe. It’s biological, mahn! Women (NOT MEN) must bear children. By the time a woman graduates law school, the biological clock is ticking. By the time she’s a 3rd-4th year associate, (i.e. over 30) the ticking gets real loud. The single ones stay on at the firms, longing for a hubby , or working for partnership (generally those that look like a moose) and many of those that are married (ugly or not) leave for cushy corporate jobs where there are good bennies, and inevitably within 6 monthis of going in house, many of them are knocked up and then off for up to a year or 2, with full bennies (other than pay).which hubby is bankrolling Most women come back, but on their terms (mommy track), with the kids at home, their hearts are biologically with the kids, staying home all the time or working from home or part time, not travelling (leaving it to saps like Mike Hunt or my equivalents elsewhere), not staying late when they’re in the office because they want to see Junior play Toto in the school play . And hey, that’s Biology man. If we have women working, we have to live with it. We can’t have it both ways. But we don’t have to just sit back and listen to this tripe.
Posted by Just another working woman - 10 months, 1 week, 1 day, 23 hours, 16 minutes ago

Golly gee, Mike, thanks so much for putting up with us (women) in the workplace. Sorry for all the “tripe”! After reading your post, I finally realized that law school was a huge mistake as biology has already decided that I should just do my best to “not look like a moose” so that I can score a breadwinning man and then start cranking out the kids. Thanks!
Posted by AH - 10 months, 6 days, 16 hours, 31 minutes ago

I recommend are reading of: Work/Life Conflict in the Legal Profession: (Keynote Address) Want Gender Equality? Die Childless at Thirty by Joan C. Williams, 27 Women’s Rts. L. Rep. 3 (Winter 2006).
Posted by JB - 10 months, 6 days, 1 hour, 11 minutes ago

MIchaela, the fact that you have chosen to sacrifice children—a biological function of women—to satisfy your ambitions speaks volumes about the kind of person you are. You should be paid less under deficient-character theory.

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