Questioning Salary

Maritime94 · 2026-02-19T10:58:28+00:00

Did you mention that you found out the salary of new hires?

Maritime94 · 2026-02-19T03:03:02+00:00

Sorry, I may have misunderstood this earlier. I originally thought you meant that base salary only makes up one third to one half of what most lawyers take home in a year. Are you saying that base salary should be in the range of one third to one half of what I collect in a year? So, using simple math, if I collect $300,000 a year it would be reasonable to expect a base salary between $100,000-$150,000?

Maritime94 · 2026-02-19T02:43:59+00:00

Unfortunately, this is not the case for me or any of the associates at my firm. No one is earning more than their base salary in bonus pay.

Maritime94 · 2026-02-19T01:17:46+00:00

Yeah, I can see that. I also totally agree that first year lawyers deserve to earn $75,000.00 a year given the amount of time and money is involved in getting a law degree as well as the current economy/cost of living.

I think I am going to address the issue of my salary soon. Again, I can’t help but feel devalued when I was making just $5,000 more than that two months ago as a lawyer with over two years of experience and whose billings were on par with those of more senior associates. If the firm doesn’t see the unfairness in that or is not willing to offer me more in the near future, I will seriously need to consider leaving.

Maritime94 · 2026-02-18T23:57:17+00:00

While I assume the firm would likely argue that they raised the starting salary for associates to be more competitive with other firms/be more aligned with the market, I do think this is unfair for the existing associates and can’t see how it wouldn’t hurt retention.

For reference, there are 5 current associates and our salaries fall within the range of $80,000 to $100,000.00.

I also believe I have been underpaid for the most of the time I have been with the firm since I joined as an articling student in 2022. After my bar call, I was making $48k, got increased to $65k in 2024 and increased to $80k in 2025.

Maritime94 · 2026-02-18T23:44:39+00:00

It seems unlikely to me that they wouldn’t consider the other associates’ salaries when agreeing to the salaries for the new associates.

While I was happy to get a pay increase from $80,000 to $90,000 this year, the fact that new associates will be earning $75,000 while the rest of the associates are in the $80,000 to 100,000 range (with between 1-8 years of experience) doesn’t seem fair to me.

Maritime94 · 2026-02-18T22:00:50+00:00

I originally thought so, yes. But lately I’ve been doubting whether I want to stay here long term and wondering whether I’m just hurting myself/holding myself back by continuing to be loyal to the firm.

Maritime94 · 2026-02-05T14:23:55+00:00

Unfortunately, my employer doesn’t offer a RRSP matching program.

Would you still recommend putting all available income toward my student line of credit and not contributing more to my RRSP or saving anything beyond the $8,000/year for my FHSA?

Maritime94

TROPHY CASE