Lawyer pay soars while most other workers see salaries stagnate

While most workers achieve substantial pay rises only in the first decade of work, lawyers - along with doctors and engineers - break that rule and see remuneration increases throughout their careers.

12 February 2015

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The typical pay pattern is for pay to grow 38 per cent as an employee ages from 25 to 55 - with the most pronounced increases happening by the time the person reaches 35, according to research from the Federal Reserve Bank of New York. Lawyers, however, are clustered in the top five per cent of earners where the pay progression pattern is steadier and adds up to a median rate of 230 per cent over that period of 30 years. Those lawyers in the top one per cent would, typically, see a 1450 per cent increase over the three-decade period. For a fifth of workers, the situation is worse - in that their pay goes down as they get older. Source: ABA