Uno

Hanson Peters Nye is also a big ins cov shop.

Can be a great experience due to the fact that you go to court and handle files immediately. The best trial lawyers typically have insurance work in their background.

FYI http://nycinsurancelaw.googlepages.com/salarychart

BIGLAW associates don't seem to comprehend that they are cannon fodder. Well-paid fodder, but fodder nevertheless.

Learning the practice of law from the ground up is the way to go if you don't care about the status and can make the money work..

I'm glad that person spelled out the difference between insurance defense and insurance coverage. Lots of lawyers in other areas think the two are synonymous.

And then there's reinsurance, which many of the big coverage shops also do.

First years doing insurance coverage in the midwest start at about $65,000. As for decent job security, I disagree. Most of these firms only have a few insurance companies that they do work for. If they lose one client, it has a huge impact.
The cases can be interesting, but you have to really suck in up and be very anti-tort reform to pull it out in the long haul, especially when you see how much the plaintiffs lawyers are making.

2:38, Haven't you heard...it's ALL about the money and prestige.

I do coverage (not in NYC), and of the firms listed I've heard only of Mendes, which basically seems like a captive of Lloyd's.

Check out Mendes' website. They separate equity and contract/non-equity partners in their attorney listings. Unless it's legally or ethically required, it's pretty tacky.

I know a partner in a Midwest ID firm. He said that start associates at around 55k but most of the partners are making 400-500k. This is good money when you think about QOL issues and cost of living. Not the greatest starting salary or prestige but you can do very well for yourself in the long run. Just shows you can make big money without going biglaw.

Anyone care to talk more about insurance coverage work. I was thinking of joining the insurance litigation group at a v10 firm in NY. Is the work interesting? are there good exit opportunities in-house? is it mostly fighting over the language of contracts?

2:52 - Are you talking about ID or coverage? $65k is pretty shitty for coverage, even in the midwest.

yeah, what is the role of biglaw in insurance litigation/arbitration? I know some big firms - like Simpson - have large insurance practices. Why is this only limited to a few big firms, doesn't make sense to me, seems like big insurance companies are big $$$$ clients.

I thought most large firms represented plaintiff policyholders. I've done some of it and it's pretty interesting, if you like contracts.

"the dumb ones" is a bit harsh. Maybe accurate, but harsh. Good to point out the difference between coverage and defense. Even within the same firm an '02 grad doing defense could be making half of what an '02 grad doing coverage makes.

From what I've seen in NYC, insurer side coverage attorneys start in the 75k range and top out at about 150k or so as a senior associate. Most partners are in the 175k-300k range. The very top partners can make a million.

Let's not forget that policyholder side coverage lawyers sit on the other side of the conference table (Dickstein Shapiro, Covington, etc) and those guys are on biglaw salary scale doing the same work. In fact, they have a much easier time of it because of a strong judicial and legislative bias in favor of insureds and against the insurer.

The biggest difference is the rates attorneys can charge to insurance comapany clients. Associate coverage rates are usually from 150-250 and most partners are below 300/hr. With those rates, the economics simply don't allow firms to pay biglaw salaries.

The only way salaries in this area will ever go up is if pressure is put on insurance companies to pay higher rates. The simple problem is that coverage firms (stupidly, IMHO) try to undercut each other on rates. Some firms are able to pull away from the pack based on quality of high end coverage work, usually Director and Officer or Employment work.

"Lots of non-top tier law students end up working for insurance companies.

The dumb ones end up doing insurance defense"

Actually this is only in NYC. Grads of TTT's elsewhere end up working in PI or other general litigation for law firms with 1-10 attorneys. At my TTT, many people ended up at the public defender, which was desperate to hire anyone with a pulse.

I was talking 65K as a starting salary for both ID and coverage. At my firm, everyone starts out doing ID, and then you move up to coverage.

Also, a new trend here in the Midwest is to have 1Ls and 2Ls at the Big Regional Firms doing insurance defense. It's putting a lot of pressure on the small ID shops. And the big firms view it as great training for their new litigators.

3:00/3:06, "insurance" related practices at elite biglaw firms is completely unrelated to this thread. (The only distant relation is that many associates leave top biglaw insurance groups to go inhouse at their former clients, and oversee the farming out of the worst work to insurance defense/coverage firms.)

2:52 - regarding job security, I agree that some firms are overly leveraged on too few insurance company clients, but the industry as a whole is pretty immune to general market pressures. People are always going to sue one another over something; whether it's SPEs, options, etc, there will always be something submitted to the insurers and someone saying it the insurer doesn't have to pay.

I do agree with you that some firms are over-leveraged. One firm in particular, which I wall call Fendes and Count, was very tied to London D&O business. When that dried up, they cut their ranks through attrition (I dont think there were lay-offs).

3:17: I don't see your logic. "Insurance" work at large law firms is just that - representing policyholders regarding coverage. How is that not insurance-related?

There's also some other economic forces at work here that limit the amount that insurer side shops can charge. Typically, there are several insurer's in a tower of insurance for a large company. Thus, each individual insurer only has 1 piece of the pie so to speak. Generally these pieces are worth anywhere from 10 to 20 million in coverage. However, the entire tower is worth 100 or 200 million or more depending the size of the company. Thus, an insurer side coverage firm has much less at stake and accordingly the insurance company client is not willing to spend as much defending the relatively smaller sum they could be liable for. However, the policyholder firm is generally fighting for coverage of the entire tower (Typically, but not always, the insurer's in the tower will advance the same position in litigation), thus the policy holder has much more at stake financially and thus is more willing to pay the BigLaw fees required to protect their claim to the policy.

Even Lat and the fabled Watchel Lipton and other jews did coverage work, See Silverstein v. WTC.

I'm a 2d year at one of the big, soul-crushing NY law firms that many of you like to vilify and though I've certainly done my share of doc review, I've also done some real lawyering. And rest assured it wasn't in a slip and fall case either.

When I clerked, we had a few laughs (the judge included) about some of the crappy ("working from the ground up") lawyers (on both sides) that we saw in two personal injury cases. Just because you can cut in state court by acting out in front of a jury doesn't make you a talented lawyer.

Practice Tip: Don't snap your gum and argue with your adversary in federal court.

To add to the tipsters list...Ross Dixon & Bell and Wiley Rein have insurer-side coverage practices. I've heard their salaries are more typical of BigLaw salaries (i.e., starting in the 125 to 135K range for 1st years). Anyone care to confirm or deny that?

The "bigger" (>25) insurance defense firms in ATL start betwen $80-$90K

The "bigger" (>25) insurance defense firms in ATL start betwen $80-$90K

3:25 - hopefully this thread won't disolve over your comments, but I need to say they are completely inappropriate.

This is a great thread which speaks to the 80% of us who didn't end up at biglaw, but still are in practice and haven't become completely disillusioned.

Lat - you have a huge untapped readership as soon as you move beyond biglaw.

From what I recall, O'Melveny and Wilmer used to do a fair amount of insurer-side coverage work. I think they still do some, but not a lot.

There are very few big firms e.g., Dickstein, Covington, that do policyholder-side coverage work. Most big firms e.g., Simpson Thacher, Hogan & Hartson, work for the insurance companies.

3:26 - What's your point, besides trolling?

3:25 - hopefully this thread won't disolve over your comments, but I need to say they are completely inappropriate.

Why are they inappropriate?

3:27 - yes RDB and WR both do insurer side coverage work. I assume those associates make the same as others in their class year. At least at WR, I think they are on biglaw scale. The difference is that those firms have also managed to include other practice areas so they are able to absorb smaller margins on the coverage work. I wouldn't suggest that they are operating at a loss on the coverage work, but they can't get the same rates they get from other areas.

Here's to hoping the WRs of the world can put pressure on other coverage firms to raise salaries.

3:34 - Are Morgan Lewis, K&L Gates and Reed Smith not big firms in your opinion?

I was one of the "dumb ones" in Boston doing insurance defense. I started at $48k and went up to $55 the second year. I liked the work, liked the people, and got tons of independent court room experience which allowed me to transition to a firm that does primarily business and corporate litigation. It's a small firm though so I still don't make anything. I am one of the few from my class who still enjoys law practice, but I hate being broke.

I did some of this pre-law school as a paralegal and while working for a lit support firm. (this was back in the 1990s).

In DC., Howrey had a sizeable insurance coverage group, as did Latham, Covington and Dickstein. Anderson Kill did this sort of work almost exclusively. All these firms represented policyholders.

On the insurers' side, Mendes frequently represented Lloyds / London Market (and had done so for a long time; they were listed as the agent for notice on policies dating back to the 1950s). Baach Robinson + Lewis also did a lot of London Market work. Rivkin Radler represented AEGIS, a big insurer of utilities. Steptoe represented The Home, I think. Jackson + Campbell represented a lot of AIG companies, if I recall correctly. Crowell + Moring may have represented an insurer, but I'm drawing a blank.

It was actually pretty interesting work - coverage for superfund sites. So the losses were in the billions of dollars, and the claims were usually under dozens of policies. (The theory being that any loss caused by, for example, pollutants seeping into the grounwater from a landfill occurred continuously over several decades. Thus, any policy ever issued during that time was on the hook for some of the loss). The policies dated back as early as the 1930s.

I worked for Ross Dixon two years ago and can confirm that their salaries were close to Big Law salaries back then.

3:26 - When you were in chambers laughing about lowly state court lawyers and their unrefined trial skills, were you drinking cognac and smoking cigars, too? It must be easy to light a cigar or sip cognac when you're by nature already looking down your nose. Thanks for giving the rest of us former federal clerks at Biglaw a bad name. We needed it.

And let's be clear that "Lots of non-top tier law students end up working for insurance companies." is not the same as "Lots of non-top tier law students end up working AT insurance companies."

In my experience, the inhouse counsel, at least on the corporate side, of insurance companies are top-tier biglaw partners and associates. Don't forget that at the end of the day, insurance firms are massive financial services companies. So while the claims organizations are hiring the dumb ones to defend the slip & falls, they're a far cry from the folks working on the AXXX securitizations, etc.

BTW, @3:40, I don't particularly consider those big firms. Nothing to do with # of lawyers, but they're not "biglaw" in my elitist view.

I work at a boutique, and the type of work I get depends on which partner is giving me an assignment. One of them occasionally does insurance defense, and I've worked on a few of those cases. Most of my work is more...substantial. I have two comments:

(1) After dragging myself through some mind boggling, complex research project, I really enjoy handling some of the insurance defense stuff. The facts tend to be interesting--either hilarious or just weird. Often, in the cases I've handled, there's security footage involved. So I get to bill the time I spend watching videos of people falling down, drunk people getting in fights, and security guards taking people down. It's a nice break from 10 straight hours of research or doc review.

(2) When dealing with relatively small claims, insurance companies are cheap and not pleasant to work for. In my other work, being right and as sure as possible is the priority, so I can research an issue to death and write and rework multiple drafts of pleadings, etc. An insurance company typically doesn't want to pay for that kind of work. If the case is only worth $20k to them, they don't want to litigate it to the death--it just isn't worth it. Obviously, if it's a bigger claim, they are more understanding.

3:47 - I get it, but then how is Dickstein "biglaw" in your elitist view?

@3:40/4:00, sorry, I should have said "in my view EITHER." I'm not 3:34. Dickstein would be even farther off my radar than the other 3.

-3:47

3:10,

Do you work in New York? If so, reconsider your position. NY is one of the LEAST insured-friendly states in the nation. If you really are talking NY, you should take a little look at the law across the Hudson River. Jersey is incredibly pro-insured. They're just plain pro-consumer.

As to you folks who think insurance covreage work is done only by small firms, you're wrong. I work at a monster firm (one of the biggest), and we do an incredible amount of coverage work. Granted, it's generally cases with exposure in the 10's of millions, but it's coverage work.

3:47 you would rather spend your time in house than in court thinking on your feet. If you refrain from using the word dumb I'll refrain from using the word dork.

Chicago insurance coverage shop (about 120 lawyers) starts 1st years in the 90'sK for 1900 billables, 4-5th years at 110 or so. There is compression. Boni from $3-13K, although realistically closer to $3K. No one bills more than 1950 unless they are stupid. People leave work at 6 at the latest.

Cases range from the stupid and boring first party cases (homeowner claims, etc.) to the $250+ MILLION dollar cases. Yes, I've handled several of those massive cases (talk about a non-nickel and dimming client on those!!!= happiness).

The big cases (+$50 million) can involve a wide range of "topics", but are usually one of the following: large property losses (eg., WTC, chemical dumping, MGP sites, Valdez, Love Canal, etc), toxic tort (asbestos, silica, etc), Securities (D&O coverage), mass product liabilities (breast implants, vioxx, etc), consumer claims (medicare fraud against big pharma, cigarettes, trans fat, etc), Advertising injury/IP (Blackberry, big pharma suing each other for various infringements, etc).

The large cases are interesting and somewhat fun because one basically learns everything there is to know about a particular industry. One also gets to see good lawyering on both sides. Doing insurer side work pits you against the best and the biggest firms. I've personally litigated cases (and won many of them at the SJ stage) against and with (as co-defs) Kirkland, Jenner, Mayer, Sullivan Cromwell, Debvoise, MoFo (actually does insurer side), Sonnenschein (both sides), Covington & Burling, Simpson Thacher (insurer), Sidley, Latham, etc.

I'm an associate and I get to go AND DO (with few exceptions on the super large cases, +80 million) pretty much all the hearings, deps, arguments, settlement conferences, mediations, briefings including S. Judgment, etc. If the case is under 20 million, I pretty much do everything (except argue before a state sup. ct.). I'm also always in contact with clients. If there is a question, the client usually calls me first. I have no idea what other mid/senior assocs do at large firms, but when I attend all the events described above, I am almost always the ONLY associate there.

The negatives are: PAY (yes, I would like to get paid more); nickel and dimming clients ("no, that 10 page single space legal memo discussing ins. cov. law in 3 states should not have taken you 12.3 hrs, but 5.2), billing at .1 of the hour, some clients don't pay travel time, etc. Overall, it beats doing ID, doc review or contract work. Actually, it should be a great place for those looking to get out of the 2500 hrs billable grind. However, we don't really advertise much and have ZERO name recognition among law students (and ergo, to all those fancy pants BigLaw assocs).

Yeah, does anyone have more info on Ross Dixon? Salaries, type of work, etc?

If you're in ID defense and getting great courtroom exposure, you should be able to bill a lot more than 10 hours in an eleven hour day. From what I've seen at my brief time at a mid-sized NYC ID firm, 1 trip to court was 3 hours billed to each of 5 different clients...

Insurance law firm salary data is collected and made available at this handy website:

http://nycinsurancelaw.googlepages.com

There are also some firm profiles. I've worked in insurance defense a total of about 2 yrs and I can say that this info is pretty accurate.

Hmm, an ATL thread that is actually informative.

Is it difficult to switch sides -- to go from biglaw policy-holder work to in-house at a big insurance firm?

Oh, and when I say $250 million case, that is my client's exposure, NOT the total value of the case, which can range in the billions (eg., EPA superfund/pollution cases, Manufactured gas plants, big asbestos, etc.)

Also, I've also handled interesting coverage cases with international implications (NOT the London Market).

4:18 - you are a god. Sounds like you should be a partner, but the partners would rather make you do all the work and pay you less.

I went to a TTT school, was top in my class, law review, moot court, etc., and couldn't get an interview anywhere. I now work at a firm that does both ID and Insurance Coverage. We are required to bill a minimum of 2000/year. As an associate a few years out I make 75K/year. The work is not particulary interesting, but I do get to do a lot of depos, mediations, arbitrations and a trial now and then. That being said, the money is not worth it for the hours I work.

Any lawfirm is going to pay you about $1 more than the amount at which you would say screw it and leave. Why would they pay anything more?

When you are all partners you will do the same thing.

4:19. Not god. Just work at aplace where, as you say (if the partners trust you) they'll let you do most of the work but pay you less. Typical experience for pay tradeoff. Also, I'm a 5th year, so all that I have described took place over that time.

I did coverage and defense work while in law school for two different boutique firms. I also did some high-end defense work (building collapse) during a summer associateship. There's a big difference between PIP defense (low end); slip-and-fall / motor vehicle (mid range); and construction accident / mass tort (high end). The guys at the PIP defense shop made $50K / year billed 40 hours / week (sometimes accomplished in far less), and left at 5 every day. The money was crap, but they were happy.

The mid-range stuff was actually interesting. Like someone else said, the facts are strange and the plaintiffs are stranger.

All in all, ID isn't a bad option for someone who can't crack big-law. Whoever said that it's a good training ground is 100% correct. I now work at a firm with 400+ attorneys and the best litigators there came from an ID firm.

3:30---
"Lat - you have a huge untapped readership as soon as you move beyond biglaw."

Absolute truth.

I used to not bother reading this site because nothing really applied to me. There is a big big world beyond biglaw and I am somewhat saddened that there is still a major disparity between biglaw and "everything else" with insurance defense being labelled as "bottom of the barrel".

While the starting salaries in ID tend to be low initially, I don't think they are so much lower compared to other areas. I graduated from a NYC T2 (ranked #50-60 per USWNR) several years ago and now work for a small ID firm after doing my time at several other firms that handled general premises liab, auto defense, legal malpractice defense, and even some coverage. Truth be told, there really isn't that much to separate the ID from the Coverage. I know from my prior firm several associates who did general premises liab who dabbled in coverage and now are working at places like Cozen O'Connor and Rivkin Radler. I find it distressing that ID gets such a bad rap. Its not like everyone in law school aspires to defend the next CEO's of Microsoft or prosecute cases against famous rap stars accused of rape. The majority of legal work still falls on the "bread and butter" areas w/in society - car accidents, personal injuries, deaths, taxes, etc.

I actually find my job a bit amusing and interesting, because even though the paperwork may seem boilerplate initially, the cast of characters involved and the personalities of judges/opposing counsel and facts of each case make for an interesting and varied work day. Like someone pointed out above, insurance companies act just like regular corporations re: the bottom line. Its all about what the client wants and what they are willing to pay. So really, in essence, practicing in the area of ins defense is no different than other areas w/in civil litigation...

I'll join those who enjoy seeing more non-biglaw stories on this site. I am a career federal law clerk and have enjoyed the coverage of law clerk issues here recently. It gets ridiculous how so many sites like Greedy Associates pretend like biglaw is all there is out there. I was at biglaw and hated it- if I lost this clerkship I'd only go back to biglaw as a last resort.

Following up on 4:51 and 4:15 -- everyone who, like me, is finding these latest posts informative, let's vote with our mice: Click on Lat's banner ads on the site. That will increase his revenue and result in additional, non-big law centric posts and content.

I clicked.

Enough of this "you have to go to a T14" talk, the world needs staff and contract attorneys too!

Where is L2L?

I have spent a career in defense work. Yes, part of the economics is leveraging associate time at a lower pay scale than Big Law and, yes, starting pay is significantly less.

Advantages - you get to be a trial lawyer. Young associates in our office are in front of a jury in a year - may be trying red car/blue car or when did the kid sweep up last around the produce bin - but they are on their feet doing what trial lawyers do. Compare that to some of my fellow Harvard Law Grads (yes, some of us in the insurance defense practice graduated from T1 schools) who are litigators and, in a couple cases, head litigation departments and have never taken a jury verdict.

There's a wonderful old piece about the difference between litigators and trial lawyers. Among the saws, "trial lawyers quote the Bible to juries, litigators have never seen a jury"; "trial lawyers take a verdict in the morning and pick a jury in the afternoon, litigators take another deposition".

There is nothing wrong with litigating, but it is a different animal from what we do. Neither is better than the other. But, if you want to try cases, you either do personal injury or criminal work.

The ID cases I saw in court were interesting if nothing else. There is something great about nailing the fakers.

So... the "dumb" ones have consciences and the "smart" ones get to work for evil?

Huzzah for ID/Coverage!!!

I saw the list at nycinsurancelaw, and it looks dismal re: salaries. I work for the City, and make better money than everyone on the list except for those at Wilson (although I probably make more if you compare our billables).

Any ledes on firms (boutique, mid-size, regional or large), that pay decently and, dare I ask, pay bonuses???

I began my career at a top Vault NY-based firm - one that was among the first to move to the $160k pay scale. After a while, I left the firm to go to an LA-based firm, again on the $160k pay scale.

I work in commercial litigation and am very well paid. This ridiculous thread is of no value to me, as it does not allow me to measure the size of my dick in relation to those dicks in the building next door. Please get back to biglaw, as I am gaining all perspective.

Insurance law firm salary data is collected and made available at this handy website:

http://nycinsurancelaw.googlepages.com

There are also some firm profiles. I've worked in insurance defense a total of about 2 yrs and I can say that this info is pretty accurate.

3:35/3:46:

My point was that it seems one of the big knocks on Biglaw is that, for all the "prestige" associated with working at these firms, associates don't develop lawyering skills. That is not true in my experience and I'm a little tired of people suggesting that you need to become an ADA or work in insurance defense to become an effective litigator. To support that pt, I shared a story about the handful of "trial lawyers" I saw in the courtroom while clerking. They were rude, theatrical, unprepared, and argued with one another on the record like children. One woman snapped gum while rolling her eyes at the judge. I don't think you have to be an elitist to think that's inappropriate behavior.

Incidentally, I went to a state school for undergrad, and I really don't care for cognac or cigars so maybe we can dispense with the classist nonsense.

6:27 to 5 inches!

6:27 to 4 inches! 3 inches!

Oh boy, looks like the firm next door is more prestigious, dude.

I work at an ID and coverage boutique in the midwest. We also do a significant amount of commercial litigation and construction work, and some plaintiff stuff. Most of what others have said about the midwest salaries is accurate. I also join in the group who would like to see more than just biglaw coverage.

I usually enjoy my work (not a no-fault state). My impression is that most ID firms in my area also do coverage - they often go hand in hand. Helps keep it interesting. The work ranges from bullshit slip and fall to wrongful death products liability - pretty much the whole gamut. As an associate, I usually get stuck with the lower-end stuff, but I'm in court, dealing with clients, and working reasonable hours. I'm also free to pursue whatever clients or practice areas I want. If I want to write wills or form LLCs or do plaintiff's side work, I can. The pay isn't great, but I leave at 5 most days.

I work ID/coverage in the South. 901 is completely right - many of the same companies assign firms both coverage and defense matters. Coverage, in my opinion, is actually the lower end of the work, paying only about the same but being MUCH MUCH more boring. I try to farm all I get out the clerks as much as possible.

We start associates at about 2/3rd the mid-law market (all that exists here in competition) but our associate pay rapidly rises. After the third year, we pay approximately equal to the biggest shops in town to those who perform competently and in reasonable amounts (2000 hours). It should be noted though that you can make 2000 in this line of work in half the time you can in a lot of transactional or commercial contexts (I *gasp* could have worked for the local version of BigLaw and simply chose not to). Partnership is guaranteed but honestly not as valuable there being much less leverage and a greater percentage of pay given to associates that perform. Nonetheless a decent book (~4000 hrs/year) will net you the same as all but the top local BigLaw partners (~500k/yr)

3:26/7:31 wrote: My point was that it seems one of the big knocks on Biglaw is that, for all the "prestige" associated with working at these firms, associates don't develop lawyering skills. That is not true in my experience and I'm a little tired of people suggesting that you need to become an ADA or work in insurance defense to become an effective litigator. To support that pt, I shared a story about the handful of "trial lawyers" I saw in the courtroom while clerking. They were rude, theatrical, unprepared, and argued with one another on the record like children. One woman snapped gum while rolling her eyes at the judge. I don't think you have to be an elitist to think that's inappropriate behavior."

To be blunt, your explanation of your derisive comment is glaringly transparent. You made an off-color and insensitive remark, intended to insult a group of people (namely ID lawyers) for the benefit of satisfying your own ego - the very fact that you admit to laughing at an entire class of litigators is shameful. And then, as if realizing your own gaffe, you tried to make yourself look less dick-ish (sorry, but it was the most appropriate adjective that came to mind), by complaining that you were the one who felt insulted (presumably by critics of BigLaw junior associates).

Although no expert, I can perhaps offer some perspective. I went to an elite (T14) law school, did well (although not top 10%), and then chose to go into government employment upon graduation. I'm now considering a move into the private sector and am interviewing at some Big law firms in NYC. Like I said, I can't independently contradict you on the amount of real litigation experience associates generally get in their early years, I can report what senior partners at top firms have told me during my interviews. And that is, uniformly (to a 1), that in having only done 4 trials and taken 3 verdicts, I have more trial experience than almost anyone at the firm, managing/senior partners included.

And here's the point: if you really love doing trial work, don't work at a big firm. You're not going to get near a courtroom for years, and if you do, only in a support capacity (2d seat by year 5 is optimistic). On the other hand, if you want money and prestige, don't work in ID. You're not going to get either, at least in the short term.

Each industry (and they really are separate and distinct industries) has advantages over the other. We should try to avoid insulting each other based on reasoned professional decisions we've each made - especially on this site, which celebrates the the all-too-uncommon occurrence of good-natured humor in our profession. The bottom line is that it's much nicer to pass my lunch hour reading about the crazy antics of legal celebrities than share barbs with people who, in other circumstances, would undoubtedly be my colleagues or friends.

And, by the way, I'm finding the discussion on this topic very instructive. I would really like to start a yahoo! group for people outside of the big-law environment who are trying to break into different fields or who are looking for advancement/lateral opportunities in insurance litigation.

For those who already practice insurance law:
What do you recommend for someone who is working a government job and would like to enter an insurance practice? I have no change of entering Biglaw, but practicing insurance law for a local mid-size firm is both realistic and appealing.
How would you prepare if you think that is on the horizon? Are there books you would recommend, etc.?

Quite possibly the most practical post (and comments section, except for a few) we have yet to see at ATL. Thanks David!

I have a question for those who practice in ID or have practiced there. I worked at a ID firm last summer doing primarily professional negligence and I will most likely have to take the offer there when I graduate. I don't particularly like it and I can't see myself doing it in the long run. However, I am curious about the ease or difficulty that people encounter in trying to move laterally after a couple of years. I am in the top third of a tier 2 school and it is really hard to get a high paying job and I am finally accepting that. I know I will get a lot more experience than my friends who are working at big law firms but how much will that help when I am looking to lateral in a few years. Any one with any advice would be appreciated.

10:28, et al.,

This has already been said, but Biglaw does plenty of coverage work. In my coverage experience I have gone up against Skadden and Preston Gates (before the great merger with Kirkpatrick & Lockhart). Also appearing in my caseload has been SullCrom, McCarter & English, Bates & Carey, Anderson Kill, Covington & Burling, and a host of NYC firms too numerous to name.

But you don't need to do Biglaw to get coverage work. There are a shitton of smaller but equally good firms doing coverage work on the carrier's side. If you want to do policyholder work, put your time in with a coverage defense firm first and then find a plaintiff's shop that is interested in expanding its coverage practice.

Of course, there's coverage and then there's coverage... A policyholder suing over a $250K homeowner's contract is one thing; a huge corporate insured suing over a $250 million D&O policy is another thing entirely. I've been involved in both; the only difference is the relative prestige and expense of the firm representing the carrier. But at least in the mega-million coverage cases, the insured can afford higher-octane representation than in smaller cases.

I do a lot of coverage litigation, and I like it. It does take brainpower, and it also gets you into the courtroom, albeit usually on SJ and 12(b)(6) motions more than actual trials. I've been to our state's Supreme Court twice on coverage cases, one of which got me a published opinion in the Atlantic Reporter. The pay isn't as great as it would be in Biglaw, but I get to go home at a reasonably decent hour, and I only have to work weekends if I'm prepping for trial or argument. QoL is a good thing.

The only problem is that if you're representing a carrier, they hate like fuck to pay bills - expect to get audited like crazy or just have your bills unilaterally cut. That's the nature of the beast.

I laugh at anyone who thinks that doing insurance defense is learning how the law works from the ground up.

socal3L: the litigation experience alone won't help unless you also improve your grades, maybe get published a little, or both. i went from ID to a federal clerkship....that's one guaranteed way of shaking ID work forever. if you can do that, i would do it. ID work sucks, but you will get GREAT experience. In my experience, however, you gotta have more than just that litigation experience to convince bigger firms to take you on as a lateral.

What's the difference between summary judgment and a Rule 12(b)(6) motion?

11:58,

I laugh at anyone who laughs at anyone who things that doing insurance defense is learning how the law works from the ground up.

Wait, strike that:

I laugh at anyone who thinks that doing endless document review is learning how the law works from the ground up.

wtf (GULC '04),
I would join your yahoo group.

Is there any difference in prestige when representing foreign carriers (Lloyd's, the market in Bermuda, etc.) v. domestic carriers?

11:58,

I laugh at sixth-year Biglaw associates who haven't appeared at so much as a sitter deposition.

It's quite funny to watch them stumble around the courtroom when they get their "big break" and roll in for a (gasp!) initial scheduling conference.

This was a great discussion until this crap started.

11:58 and the cigar and cognac law clerk who couldn't get an appeals court job:

Are your opinions based upon your years of courtroom experience or just your disdain for attorneys who represent individuals, have to actually produce results to make a living and did not go to top schools? Unfortunately you will never get into a courtroom and so we will never have the pleasure of one of these trial attorneys wiping the floor with you.

I've been following ATL's "Non-Top-Tier Law Student Week" and it got me thinking about first-year associate pay at BigLaw firms. I've posted a rather extensive blog on it and I welcome all ATL readers to read and comment on it (respectfully, of course).

My site is:
getintuit.blogspot.com

Thanks to all (or any) who take the time to visit.

I thought I made my distaste for cognac and cigars clear. I guess not. To reiterate, my opinion is based on my experience clerking for a year. My disdain is not for any particular class of lawyers. I criticized the handful of personal injury and insurance defense lawyers I saw in court and then made a larger pt. about how I think many of you mistakenly believe that working at one of these firms provides a better litigation foundation than biglaw. 10:03, I think your assessment of my initial post is pretty harsh and your generalizations about biglaw don't comport with MY experiece. I'm sorry you feel the need to justify your decision to work in Govt (and ram home the fact you went to GTown). If a lawyer is happy with their career choices whether in the private sector (biglaw, solo practice whatever) or the public sector, then that is wonderful. There are too many unhappy people in this profession.

9:57, you'll be happy to know I am in the process of applying for a COA clerkship now that I am in a position to pay-off my loans. I'll keep you posted.

Just know that as I type this I am snapping my gum and rolling my eyes. Get to work, you make way to much money to waste time cruising the internet at 10:34 in the morning.

I will grant you that it probably depends on whether you want to be a litigator or a trial attorney. But make no mistake, everyone wants to earn as much money as possible and would if they could.

10:34 -

With all due respect, I'm calling B.S. on your post.

You exrapolated the conduct of the parties in two cases (out of how many your judge handled during your year?) and spun it into a slam on an entire class of attorneys, for no reason other than to prop up your inflated sense of self-worth.

Wow, you can pick out obvious breaches of courtroom decorum. Congratulations on that...

Quite frankly, notwithstanding your clerking experience, you don't know enough (yet) to judge who has talent and who does not.

And just to pile on a bit, while you and your judge were getting paid with tax dollars the attorneys you disdain were working for a living.

OK, so I have no idea if this will take off or not, but I thought there might be enough demand, so I've started a Yahoo! group dedicated to discussing lateral opportunities for those of us NOT working in BigLaw. Absolutely no cognac-sniffing, cigar-smokers allowed. Strictly real lawyers.

ID/Coverage attorneys are especially welcome to join. You can find the group here:

http://groups.yahoo.com/group/biglawalt/

I left biglaw to go to a smallish (40+) litigation shop. 30-50% of my work is insurance coverage. The cases are big ($100m+) and there is no nickel and diming from the client. The cases are interesting, pay is top of the market for biglaw, and my friends at big firms say I'm doing the work a junior partner would do at their firm (i.e., lots of deps, arguing contested motions, trial, etc.). I interview a lot of big law associates looking to lateral. They're out 2-5 years out and their resumes are pathetic. The most interesting thing they've done is go to law school. But they have no clue about insurance coverage and they turn their nose up at it. Then they go back to document review, writing memos, whatever they do. But they're happy because at least they're not doing insurance coverage.

9/25 11:45:

I bet we have crossed paths at some point in our carreers. Where do you practice? NJ? I concur with your sentiments. The thing I hate the most is the stupid audits by the ins. co. It is just way annoying. They question everything, unless is a case where tens of millions is at stake...only then they back off.

9/25 9:26:

I disagree. Perhaps in your market you get ID cases (auto, premises liab, etc) and also handle the coverage work. And that's fine, except that is not the "more complex" coverage work I'm referring to.

But like others have said, it is a whole different ballgame when you are litigating a case where the insured is a fortune 20 company who has been sued by X (insert your plaintiff du jour: government, 1000's of asbestos "victims", another competitor company, shareholders, etc.) for hundreds of million of dollars. I would argue that type of coverage is more "sophisticated" and complex than most typical ID cases, and the stakes much higher. I would never do coverage work if I only worked on the "small" matters. I would agree with you there -- that would be boring. However, there is some egotistical satisfaction I gain from working on "big" cases with some the best attorneys in the nation. The quality of the written product during briefing by the opposing side (and co-defs) is just a notch above and so are oral arguments.

Cigar & Cognac clerk/10:34: I think the poster @ 10:48 may be correct to some extent, in that we may be talking about 2 different things - litigation in general and trial advocacy. You can do a LOT of litigation work at a big firm - but in your first 3 years it will be - for the most part - in a support capacity and have little to no relation to what trial lawyers do.

As for my decision to work in gov't, I've never attempted to justify it; no justification is required. I did what I wanted to do and I'm happy doing it. And in that regard, 10:48 is wrong. Not everyone's in it for the money alone. In the final analysis, happiness is worth a lot more than a big pile of cash. I only brought up my pedigree as an example to demonstrate the fallacy of the statement that you're "dumb" if you don't work in BigLaw.

Do I intend to stay in gov't forever? Probably not. Do I see the value in a BigLaw job? Certainly. Does having an AmLaw 100 name in my signature line determine who I am or how I should treat people? Absolutely not.

The bottom line is that you should be careful who you laugh at and why. It rarely says anything too definitive about them, and often says much more about the kind of person you are, which in this case, appears to be a spoiled, novice attorney.

Anyone know what salaries are like at Bailey Cavalieri?

Any salary reports from Boundas Skarzynski? Mound Cotton? D'Amato?

I worked at Boundas and I can confidently say that it is a joke of a law firm. The salary is way below market, the work is more than boring, and the people . . . well, one partner, who shall be nameless, is so abusive to associates that the firm's CLIENTS don't even want to work with her. Another partner went through four secretaries in five months and never once considered the possibility that he, not the secretaries, may be the problem. Boundas treats people so badly that former employees have sued the firm for discrimination. Basically, the firm keeps clients by playing golf with them, taking them out to dinner, and kissing their asses. I'm sure there are respectable firms that do insurance coverage work, but Boundas is not one of them.

so everytime i google "insurance defense" i come upon these blogs, with pretty much every lawyer and law student critizing the profession. well try this, going to law school post-september 11th, the economy tanked, law school applications skyrocketed, my class at a top tier (state) school was overrun with harvard and columbia alums (often with graduate degrees already), graduating in the top of your class, being on law review, moot court,....doing everything "right" to get a good job....and guess the only firms who will even LOOK at me for an interview--insurance defense. so it makes me really angry when so many people who haven't even been in the practice yet or who were fortunate enough to get a big law firm job and make $160K a year criticize insurance defense. it is a job. it is a job practicing law. it is a job that allows me to draft motions and pleadings, do legal research, answer and propound discovery, take depositions, appear in court for not just case management conferences, mind you, but also to argue dispositive motions, sit second chair at trial (as a first year attorney), and have extensive client contact. but my profession is criticized. thanks, you arrogant people--and thank you for reaffirming my opinion of most lawyers and law students.

It is funny how this thread has become the definitive source for insurance attorneys to talk about their jobs and salaries.

Anyway, does anyone have anything to post about bonuses and salary increases? My firm just announced and everyone is disappointed - compared to what we all got last year. Raises are lower and bonuses (if any) bear no relation to hours worked or other "contributions" to the firm. Most think bonuses are based on which partner you work with and whether they have enough pull within the partnership to get you some money. From what I can gather, bonus plus increase for most years is in the 10k-20k range, with most at the lower end.

One thing there is never a shortage of is arrogant asshole lawyers - you know, the guys who went to law school because they couldn't get a date. But, enough about most of you. I attended a top ten law school and then worked at the biggest firm making the highest salary in the city - a top 30 city. After 3 years I had hd enough of billing my life away and became a dummy working in-house as an ID attorney. Now I make $115,000 with great benefits, I try interesting cases in state and federal courts - recently tried a case in front of 99y/o judge Brown in federal court in Kansas - defend bad faith and other large damage claims against my insurance company, and generally am a better trial lawyer than 99 % of the "smart ones." Oh, I also do much of my work on my notebook at Starbucks, as there are no billable hour requirements - just a "do a good job requirement."
So, when I am closing up my notebook at 4:30 to head to the gym for a workout and then to diner with my wife at the local pub, this dummy will be raising a toast - not to you smart ones who still have 2.5billables to account for - but to me for having the best damn law job there is. One final note - I look forward to kicking some smart boys ass if he or she ever musters up the guts to venture into a courtroom.

Ross Dixon pays $135, $145, $160, $175, $190, $200, $210

I work for a midsize defense firm (45 lawyers) in the New York suburbs. Here, defense and coverage are mixed. The distinguishing feature of the firm is that about 50% of the work is professional liability, chiefly architects/engineers, but also accountants, lawyers, and some med-mal. These are "mid-range" cases, as someone here has described them. On the architect/engineer side, they are really commercial matters -- construction defect, construction delay, adjoining property damage -- ranging from chiefly from $200k to $10mil. There are also some environmental liability cases, some of which are bigger. Billing rates are $160-190 for associates, both for ID and coverage. One other note I would make on this issue is that even a small firm can, over time, build relationship with insurance company clients which will ensure that the firm is not nickel-and-dimed, or nickel-and-dimed less than others.

I would agree with most of the posters' descriptions of the opportunities presented by this work for a junior associate: they are excellent, with very early courtroom exposure and, given the right environment, an opportunity to learn from very seasoned lawyers right away. While we do see some relatively big names alongside or opposite us, such as K&L Gates, it must be admitted that, much more often, we run into poor advocates with terrible writing skills, unprofessional offices, and other indicia of pettifoggery. For example, many of my colleagues know Tom Decea, who was Lawyer of the Day on this blog recently, very well and have been with him on cases. Fortunately for my firm, to a man (not to mention the women), they consider him an awful human being. Not that there are not awful features to our own firm, chief among them the pay. The starting salary for 1st-years is an abysmal $55K, and the progression from there is very slow. I think, however, that this is below market rate for this type of firm.