How come lawyers don’t hate their lives as much as bankers do?
I’m sure you’ve all seen that meme that goes something like “sometimes when I’m working a deal late into the night, I remember the lawyers that are working on our deal and I instantly feel better.”
If this is true, how come there isn’t nearly as much talk about the brutal lifestyles/WLB of the lawyers working behind the M&A, RX, and PE deals?
Maybe there is and I am just oblivious to it, but it seems like banking gets way more hate, despite these lawyers having it even worse.
For starters, there’s no “Big Law or Am Law oasis” or whatever would be the WSO equivalent. If there were, it would probably go about the same way as this forum. Second, there may be times where Big Law associates have to push upwards of 80 hour weeks, but, from the associates I know at K&E, WLR&K and L&W, they are probably averaging from 8AM-7/8 PM M-F and a few hours on Saturday. There may be some deals in M&A and RX especially that demand a few 3AM nights, but the average hours on an annual spread are just far less than average IB hours.
WLRK gets worked
They do, and you're on a finance site, so don't see those gripes. Go on R/Biglaw, etc, and you'll get a clearer picture.
Also, I bet the median age of big law people is quite a bit older than M&A teams. I bet a typical banker would be 4 years into their career by the time one is a big law associate. So even if the hours aren't AS bad, more of them have families, life obligations, etc.
They work a ton of hours also. Tbh, growing up (in an environment where I had zero exposure outside of movies to finance and IB), I always had the impression that doctors and lawyers were the most grueling white collar professions and that finance, while intense, wasn’t as much about long hours.
Personally, it feels like a big contributor to the difference in complaints is the sunk cost.
You can go to MBA and come out doing a wide range of finance and business jobs.
But if you go to Law School, you’re a lawyer. There isn’t really that much other flexibility. You can complain all you want, but it’s pointless because you’re still a lawyer and you’ve invested all your time and energy in your early 20s to get through law school and pass the Bar.
On the other hand, IB is relatively easy to land - no specific degree required, no grad school required, no difficult bar-like exams (the Series exams are a joke). And once you get there, most have the expectation of exiting already, so of course there’s going to be more complaints because this is a job that many people don’t want to do in the first place and there is a clear way out.
You’ll notice senior Associates / VP+ don’t tend to complain as much because there is a self-selection effect there. Lawyers just go through that selection in school before they start at an actual law firm.
This is absolutely correct. Law school is a natural weeder. Instead of a 21 yo starting in banking and lasting only ~1-2 years, that same 21 yo is now in Law School trying to cram hundreds of pages worth of reading for a class, only to do that for 3 years straight. Law school is like bootcamp, if you survive those 3 years then the you should be relatively ready for being a lawyer. You also incur hundreds of thousands of debt to go to law school and are payed incredibly well (23-24 yo making VP level money in banking) once you start. But similar with banking, young lawyers almost always end up leaving to do something else after 2-3 of work to build their case knowledge. I know many lawyers to went to incredibly prestigious school, started their career in Kirkland & Ellis, and then left to do either A) something else law related but at a much smaller law firm, or B) left completely to do something in corporate. There is no job where people work 60+ hours and don't complain, even if you make 250-300k+ doing in. At some point in your life you begin to stop thinking of a better work situation / WLB and ultimately trust yourself to go get it.
For all students, young adults starting an internship, or even recent grads: nothing is set in stone. Trust yourself and learn from any experiences you get. Don't rush the process of your career, trust the path you set yourself and you'll see how in 1 year you'll grow as a person. If you end up not liking banking or whatever high finance career you started in, you have opened up doors you didn't even realize you opened. You only have 1 life on this earth, and even that can disrupted at a young age (illness does not care who you are, what you do, or how old you are), go enjoy life and try to help those who aren't as lucky.
Law school is not a natural weeder. I know plenty of people in law school and plenty in banking analyst programs; banking is MUCH more brutal, and it isn’t close. You never hear of law students working 110-hour weeks and suffering pancreas failure as a result.
However, you’re right about the debt thing (unless parents pay), and the pay isn’t really VP level in law (it’s more like $250k at an all-time high, whereas IB associates are making that with 0 debt in what I’d call a ‘dark age’ for finance pay), though the pay per hour is better in law at every stage vs. finance until ... well … yeah, it’s better.
You’re right in suggesting there are trade-offs. If your parents can pay for law school imo, it’s a better choice. If not …
Mostly agree, but first year BigLaw associates (outside Wachtell) absolutely are not making banking VP money. Most aren't even making high finance associate money.
1st year law associates are not making VP money lmao. Cravath scale has it at $245k. PJT/CVP/EVR etc are paying $700k
Most lawyers aren't paid well.
They do. I have many friends in BigLaw who absolutely hate it, but they're more stuck there.
A highly qualified 22 year old banker can jump to something else or take a pay cut very easily without many financial consequences, someone with 3 years of law school + significant loans isn't as easily able to leave a very high paying job and most law exits aren't available until you have some experience.
Law is very bifurcated into “people whose parents bankrolled law school” and “people who had to go $300k into debt for law school.” The former basically had their parents pay their way out of the gruelling analyst years. The latter has the worst case of “golden handcuffs” this world has seen.
A fair apples to apples for the former would be if every finance job came with a $300k signing bonus from mom and dad.
I think law firms offer a lot more perks compared to banks, making it bearable. The big law firms I know of have free food events almost every day, and nice pantries, so you don't have to pay out of pocket for food.
They also have lots of dinners/cocktail events, and don't penny pinch on expenses vs banks that watch every tiny expense. However, this may be changing with the consolidation of law firms. Law firms post mergers are eliminating or slowing down new partner promotion ranks, and generally adopting a more corporate structure.
I do think that depending on the field in finance, a lawyer should be able to easily do a banking role. A lot of the structuring comes from legal doc execution. Who can better structure a deal than a lawyer? It used to be the norm that most wall street people went to law school and worked in a law firm for a few years before going to the origination side. Just look at most well known executives on wall street, they have legal backgrounds.
A few things going on here:
1. Law, on average isn’t as gruelling in terms of raw hours and conditions as IB, PE, or even ER. The pain points there simply aren’t centered around “I pulled three straight all-nighters.” Does that happen? Yes, occasionally. But the hours-to-pay ratio is simply better, and there’s little getting around that. That’s why, even if there was a law version of WSO … it wouldn’t look like this (r/Biglaw hours suggest ~60/week is typical).
2. Quite frankly, law, in some ways, is a “pay to play” out of your worst analyst years. Imagine if you could pay $300,000 at age 21 (either via debt or through parents’ handouts) to skip right to associate, and spend those three years in the interim in school. Yes, you’d have to get into that school (harder academically but less opaque and random a process than IB networking/interviewing), but once you were there … three years and right to associate. I’d wager there would be less complaining if parents bankrolled. If not, there is the very real handcuffs of student loans, which is something that we don’t discuss as much, but is much more prevalent in law.
3. These things are cyclical. Pre-GFC, the comp in finance was simply so much higher that all of this pain was justified. Many lawyers wanted to become bankers. A generation of lawyers told their children that finance was the “promised land.” Then … law pay shot up, finance pay stagnated, IB attracted headlines like the Baird/Jefferies ones, and now it feels like we’re going to tell our children to go into law. But what if law consolidates/their pay stagnates and deals pick up and ours increases? As of May 2025, law is “in the lead” given how bad the finance job market is now (I agree), but over a 5, 10, or 20-year horizon? Who knows.
I still think that law is “better” return on labor if your parents bankroll you through law school, but the fair analogy would be if your parents offered to either bankroll law school or hand you $300,000 as an analyst 1 in finance.
This. I applied to HLS my in my senior year of college and got in. I deferred my acceptance for a year so I can honor my FT offer and have a year of IB under my belt before law school. Their financial aid was quite good to me, so I won’t go into massive debt.
All my networking after getting in were people telling me that it’s not clear which will be more lucrative further down the line, so opt for the route I’m better at / more interested in.
Networking was* please watch your grammar. Clearly, the standard in law school has lowered quite a bit.
As a lawyer with too many lawyer friends who now works in finance, you are right in that lawyers don't hat their lives as much as bankers do. Lawyers hate their lives more.
The difference is that there is no legal equivalent to WSO so you pretty much have to actually know lawyers in order to appreciate this.
May I ask why?
The biggest thing that comes to mind is the upfront cost of law school. I can understand that, if parents cannot cover this, it’s the worst “golden handcuffs” that exist.
However, beyond that, it seems like better pay-per-hour, more “lockstep” path/predictable pay increases, slightly better hours/conditions (I understand not always, but can it be “Baird Industrials” tier?), less market-dependent, school vs. being an IB analyst (how is the former worse?), and greater odds of becoming a partner (vs. MD).
It almost seems like a no-brainer to me if parents pay for law school.
If they don’t, it’s much harder to decide given the $300k debt.
Definitely. And you certainly bring up reasonable points. I am going to address what you said pretty much in order.
(1) While law school does have an upfront cost, it isn't as bad as it seems. While there is no graduate-level education that is de jure required in finance like there is for law, there is a de facto standard path. And this standard finance path does include an MBA. So even with the high up-front cost, when you include the fact that the finance bro is likely going to go get an MBA, even the up-front costs aren't as bad as they first seem. You still are behind in law, but it just isn't as bad if you do the full analysis.
(2) The pay-per-hour that you identify is generally true but ONLY FOR a very small portion of the legal profession. There are only a very small number of firms that make the pay-per-hour tilt in favor of law, and that is only for the relatively junior ranks. The firms that pay at or about the Cravath scale represents a relatively small portion of the total legal profession. And this is the case even when you stick to just corporate law (ie - remove the government, nonprofit, con law practices, etc). If you can get a job at Wachtell or S&C or Kirkland, sure. But this is also like comparing the typical IB experience to that of someone at MS or JPM.
(3) The same holds true with the more "lockstep" path/predictable pay increases. If you are at a relatively established law firm, you absolutely will have predictably in your compensation. And, if you are at a large law firm, this floor will be relatively high. Bankers absolutely have more volatility in their earnings potential. But a high-end banker will always be able to earn more than a high-end lawyer pretty much in any situation unless they are working at Wachtell or like one of 5 other law firms. This is very much a risk-reward thing. If we stick with just the firms you are thinking of, there is a higher floor but there is much less upside.
But, as is going to be a common theme, this doesn't include most other law firms. Most law firms won't have the high base you are thinking of. There is a reason why comp is bimodal in law. You are either at a firm that is at or about the Cravath scale or you are basically making entry-level out of undergrad comp. There is very little in between. And most law firms don't pay Cravath levels.
And law firms, like banks, also have an up and out culture at the junior levels. Once you make partner you have a much more stable gig in law than as an MD in banking but getting there is just as brutal. In fact, in some ways it is even harder in law. In banking, as you become more senior, you pretty much become a sales figure that uses the underlying work of the analysts/associates/etc. In law, even as a senior partner you'll still be expected to do some portion of the actual work. It isn't the "pure sales job" that being an MD is. And that makes being a partner in law much harder because you can't just be good at doing the work or doing the sales because you need to be competent at both. As an MD, you simply don't need to be good at doing the work in that way.
(4) Yes. It absolutely can be Baird Industrials level. Kirkland is a great example of this.
(5) "less market-dependent."
It depends on the field you are in. M&A law, securities law, bankruptcy law, etc all follow the same market dynamics as on the banking side. And this is before looking at all the metric fucton of other non-corporate legal fields.
(6) "school vs. being an IB analyst (how is the former worse?)"
Delaying the "IB analyst" experience, which is effectively what going to law school is, doesn't mean lawyers don't go through a similar pain. It just pushes it off until you are older and likely have other constraints on your time.
(7) "greater odds of becoming a partner (vs. MD)."
Similar to what I said previously, this is not necessarily true. In fact, in some ways it is harder because you have to do well at sales and the actual work itself. Although you do get a benefit of a stronger customer retention. It is much more common to be flip flopping banks than it is lawyers. And becoming a partner at a law firm requires much more of a commitment for a law firm than making someone an MD is. Once you have equity in a private company, it is much harder to get rid of them.
Definitely not easier to become a big law partner than IB MD lol. Big law equity partner is the only high paying job in the law period. It's not like you can jump to PE or HFs. It's incredibly difficult to make equity partner at a top firm
Bingo. From personal experience, I've seen lawyers complain about a 70-80 hour work week much more than I've seen bankers complain about a 90-100 hour work week.
One of the things bankers seem not to understand is that law firms, outside of like Wachtell and maybe 5 others (excluding their restructuring practices), bill by the hour. Or at least have their lawyers track their time in 6-minute increments.
So yes. Bankers will work more hours. This is absolutely true. But they don't have billable hour requirements. HAVING to bill a certain number of hours makes the less time much more stressful.
I think that's the big driver of what you are talking about
The only major difference between corporate lawyers and bankers is that the lawyers have even more student debt and are even more "stuck" in their jobs. They hate their lives too.
Lol facts
A point that I think hasn’t been made yet: the kid going into banking has higher personal expectations for his or her career than the average lawyer. Many bankers think they will go on to be the next paul singer, henry kravitz, larry fink, izzy englander etc., but most lawyers know that their ceiling is lower, and that tempers certain frustration when reaching your 30s and beyond. I have been on r/biglaw and seen the dissatisfaction as well, but those guys know for almost certain that they won’t be the titans of industry the top dogs in finance are. I mean, can anyone name one billionaire or even globally known lawyer?
I agree that most lawyers have already had their expectations ground down, but half of US presidents and one of the four finance icons you listed were lawyers so I don't think there's a shortage of successful role models (albeit none of them just went from junior associate to partner, but the trailblazing finance people made equivalent leaps from 'the path').
Political ambitions fair enough.
But for financial ambitions, the ex-lawyers in finance transitioned when the JD was what people did instead of an MBA. It used to be a lot easier to transition back then - not anymore. Either way they made their money in finance not law
Xxxxxxx
yep, this is more important than one may think. In finance you are motivated to push because you think that the skillset you are building/contacts/etc. puts you closer to one day do something grandiose (or at a more humble level secure a comfortable buy-side path).
In law, when you imagine yourself in the next 1/3/5/10/20/30 years you are at the same office/similar office, doing almost the same type of work albeit for a higher pay. This may be fine for some, but those that gunned for biglaw and did T14/Clerkships, not sure how comfortable are they with this future.
John Morgan is worth $1.5B lol and he's likely running for governor of Florida next year
They definitely do and seems like they hate their life more than bankers with more wanting to switch to IB than the other way around.
Think about it:
Tl;dr by any rational analysis big law is worse than IB/PE/HF unless you love law.
Agree mostly but while the work might be more boring in the abstract, at the junior POV it doesn't really matter. The only people "running" the deal are the buyer and seller, any random banker (even average execution MD) isn't really "running" anything, that is something that is told to juniors so they don't revolt while working 100 hour weeks.
So, in other words, the “pain” in law is back-loaded (that is … the hours get worse as you climb, it is harder to climb beyond associate, the exits are not there, the comp does not scale as quickly for seniors, the work does not evolve to become interesting), but the “cushiness” is front-loaded (better starting comp, enjoying school vs being an IB associate for three years, better starting hours, more certain early career lockstep promotion).
Maybe this is why the complaining seems worse among junior bankers - banking is worse when you’re 35, the age at which you’ll see people complain online, whereas lawyers >35 may very well be more miserable but aren’t venting on online forums.
I don't disagree with any of your points in principle, but there are absolutely billionaire lawyers... you can make a shit ton of money if you start your own shop (no different than starting your own bank or PE fund). These guys are almost never the typical corporate M&A/BX/litigation lawyers at BigLaw, but rather founders of tort litigation firms where they operate on a success fee basis. These guys are also typically billionaires via having literally earned a billion dollars in income, vs. banking/PE founders who have a lot of net worth tied in long-term carry or GP/bank ownership stakes.
If you run the math I'm sure finance has produced more billionaires (both on an absolute and per capita basis) but there are tons of billionaire lawyers.
You do know what it means to be a billionaire, right?
(I say this as Jamail is literally responsible for end-result of one of my favorite M&A case studies)
they got hella cognitive dissonance so they gotta pretend they love it. They're not as vocal about the hate because they invested 3 additional years at school to also be a bot for 2 years before they can do their own private practice and be an ambulance chaser. whereas in banking we have less upfront investments (besides studying for interviews and networking).
why are there more women pursuing law than finance?
They do... you just don't know enough lawyers
Cause they make 2k an hour to screen share and debate closing checklists for 4 hours every day
Its a decent observation. They are always working, always on the phone. Our interactions with them arent likely totally genuine bc they see us as a client. But when they are partner level, they really do seem to have it better than a finance equivalent at partner level.
They do. Also, from what I gather, billable hours are what matter the most + the work is alot more repetitive / structured than even IB, unless you're in litigation or smth else. There's a reason why they spend hours arguing over "what's market".
Another benefit that they get and we don't - personal offices even at a junior level (I fucking hate the american style of a "bull pen" for all but the MDs - it benefits no one and pisses off everyone. I don't need to hear my deskmate's loud chewing)
On the other hand, if you think your job is toxic, apparently law seniors give bankers a run for their money when pissed off. And friends in corporate tell me that even they cringe when they hear the liti guys loose it at their teams.
law is an individual professional path that relies on your brain and legal knowledge to carry a matter, and collaboration is rarely needed
banking is a busines under a constantly evolving market/business landscape, so know-how/support/different backgrounds requires open spaces to allow and encourage sharing information/knowledge and to do it also quickly
yeah, and tbf, the PMO part of IB sell-side / PE is the most annoying part of it all. Corporate lawyers don't have that and are just focused on their own workstream (for most part, w/ limited commercial contribution)
I do think their suicide rate / alcoholism rate is pretty high, sadly.
But some of them are so good at what they do, they really seem happy with it almost like an academic endeavor for them.
You're almost starting to make me feel bad for consistently emailing the main firm we work with super last minute for everything... >:D
You're absolutely right to question the discrepancy—lawyers on M&A and restructuring deals are often grinding just as hard as bankers, sometimes harder. They’re pulled into every twist of a deal, work deep into the night, and get bombarded with last-minute changes from multiple parties. Yet somehow, they don’t seem to get roasted online or memed into oblivion like investment bankers do.
One big reason is the difference in expectations. A lot of people who go into BigLaw kind of know what they’re signing up for. The narrative isn’t sugar-coated—everyone hears about the 80-hour weeks and the doc review marathons in law school. So when they’re neck-deep in a deal and it’s 2 a.m., it’s awful, yeah, but it’s not surprising.
In contrast, banking gets hyped. The prestige, the bonuses, the "Wall Street" lifestyle—it attracts a lot of people who think they’re walking into fast-paced dealmaking and alpha energy. But then they realize they’re mostly doing Excel grunt work and waiting on comments for 12 hours straight. The disappointment hits different, and they’re way more vocal about it. That’s why the memes flow.
Another part of it is culture. In finance, especially among junior bankers, there’s this very online, very loud, very self-deprecating culture of complaining. It’s half-therapy, half-status signal—“I’m suffering, therefore I’m legit.” Lawyers might be suffering just as much, but the legal world doesn’t meme it the same way. They suffer in silence, or just don’t waste time on WSO at 3 a.m.
And let’s be real—exit opportunities make a difference in how people cope. Bankers always feel like they’re grinding toward something better: PE, HF, VC, or a sweet corp dev gig. Lawyers? Not so much. Many feel locked into a long-term BigLaw track or forced to take a pay cut going in-house. So while bankers might hate life now, they have a path out. Lawyers just accept that this is the game.
So yeah, the pain is probably equal, but the visibility—and the drama—is different. Bankers just complain louder, meme harder, and post more about how much it sucks. Doesn’t mean lawyers have it easier—they’re just suffering with a better poker face.
Ok chatgpt
.
I was an m&a lawyer at a v5 for a couple years
I promise you the premise of this question is laughable. I hated being a lawyer so much that banking felt like an upgrade
Would you mind listing the pros and cons relative to each? Law is currently an option I'm mildly interested in, so I'd love to hear from someone with exposure to both fields.
Surprising how little is known here about big law. My wife works in big law, and in b school I had a lot of law school friends (the 10% of their class that actually partied, it's literally the reverse of b school where 90% of students party), so my big law network is actually somewhat large.
For starters, their hours are absolutely just as bad..arguably worse. They're under constant pressure to meet their billable hours quota, which means they have to schmooze with partners to give them work / constantly prove their competency to earn said work. Much of the work they do isn't considered billable, so for a day where you're billing 8 hours, you could easily be working double that. All my friends have had countless all-nighters and it's common for them to be working until 3, 4 or 5 am...
The work we do in banking as a whole is not overly complex and can honestly prob be done drunk and/or stoned. Lawyers have to synthesize dozens of pages and come up with articulated solutions...your brain has to be on and you have to be dialed in when on the clock. Granted, 1st year big law associates do a decent amount of mindless bitch work too.
Anyone that works in big law can attest that the culture is very toxic. It's filled with condescending, passive aggressive pussies who shit on their associates on a daily basis. Kindhearted partners are without a doubt the exception, not the norm.
Someone mentioned it earlier, but they're spot on in that there aren't many exit opportunities for lawyers. Once you're on the law career track, you're basically pigeon-holed. The goal for most burnt out big law associates is to go in-house (i.e. legal counsel at a firm, our corp dev equivalent), which involves a significant pay cut but hours improve tremendously. It's actually very competitive because there are so many miserable big law associates trying to leave.
Oh and they do have a Wall Street Oasis equivalent, it's called Fish Bowl.
I'd argue the billable hours quota is what makes the hours way worse than whatever actual BigLaw lawyers actually work. There is a fundamental difference between working long hours because that's what it takes to get the job done and working long hours because you literally need to in order to hit requirements
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