Skaddenfreude: 'W' Firms, and Morning Open Thread

We don’t have memos, but we can confirm associate pay raises at two large law firms:

(1) D.C. powerhouse Wiley Rein & Fielding, former home of the new White House counsel, Fred Fielding; and

(2) Wilson Sonsini Goodrich & Rosati, home of Silicon Valley legal god Larry Sonsini (although a god who, in the past year or so, has shown signs of being fallible).

More details, plus your comments, after the jump.


WILEY REIN
Yesterday someone posted this comment:

Wiley Rein raised to $145K for first years on the 1950 [billable hours] track, and $125K for first years on the 1800 track. They basically followed Hogan’s salary structure, with one or two slight differences in upper-levels.

We have confirmed this with a source at the firm. There’s no memo because the news was conveyed orally, at an “all associates” meeting held yesterday. The numbers were projected on a screen for everyone to view.
We have also confirmed that the Wiley Rein scale is consistent with Hogan & Hartson’s for the first five years: 145 / 155 / 170 / 190 / 210.
(In case you’re curious, “Wiley Rein & Fielding” became “Wiley Rein” effective February 1, 2007. Press release here.)
WILSON SONSINI GOODRICH & ROSATI
After seeing a few of your comments, we headed over to Infirmation / Greedy SF / SV, where we found this post:
Scale is below, parantheses indicates rate for high performance rating, which something like 2/3 of eligible associates receive – note that this is retroactive only to Feb 1, not Jan 1 like everyone else (sigh, shake head).
Everywhere but NY:
145
155
170
190
210
215 (225)
225 (240)
240 (250)
250 (260)
New York
160
170
185
210
230
240 (250)
250 (265)
265 (280)
280 (290)
We have independently verified this information with a source at the firm, so you can consider it accurate.
Earlier: Prior ATL coverage of associate pay raises (scroll down)

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