Salary benchmarks
Polsinelli Salary 2026: Three First-Year Office Bands
Polsinelli salary in 2026 is not one lockstep. Chambers, accessed 7 October 2026, lists a Kansas City first-year at $210,000 and a New York City first-year at $225,000. A general counsel who pastes the July 2026 market floor onto either cell is pricing a memo the firm has not published.
Two buyers. Three first-year bands.
Polsinelli salary is the question a general counsel asks when the invoice is already on the healthcare or real-estate panel and the next hire has to sit on the company payroll.
Sartori's New York interview cohort (1675 structured interviews) keeps hearing the same miss: the buyer prices one national number, and the letter is for one city.
Kansas City, St. Louis, Birmingham, Chattanooga, and Charleston first-years are listed at $210,000 on the Chambers associate comparison, accessed 7 October 2026. Chambers ↗
Four numbers, two buyers. The associate reads an office. The general counsel reads a 2025 in-house title. Neither number is a 2026 class-year match. Every figure is cited below.
- $1.21B
- Polsinelli 2025 gross revenue, up 25.5 percent, in the 10 June 2026 Missouri firm ranking.
- Missouri Lawyers Media, 10 June 2026
- #55
- 2026 Am Law 100 revenue rank, four places above the prior year, in the firm's 15 April 2026 release.
- Polsinelli release, 15 April 2026
- 1,200
- Lawyers the chief executive cited in the same June 2026 interview. A headcount remark, not an Am Law census.
- Missouri Lawyers Media, 10 June 2026
A senior-attorney requisition loses to the Kansas City first-year before year four is even discussed.
Polsinelli salary: the published first-year and second-year bands
Open the office table first. Year three and the bonus are not on it, and a 2026 match is not a blank you fill from the market.
Chambers' associate salary comparison, accessed 7 October 2026, prints Polsinelli in three bands and stops at year two. The same page already shows Milbank's first-year at $235,000, so the comparison has been touched since the 2 June 2026 raise. It does not carry an “as of” date. The grid below is that row, not a reconstruction.
| Band | Offices | 1st year | 2nd year |
|---|---|---|---|
| Major offices | Boston, Chicago, Washington DC, Dallas, Ft. Worth, Houston, Los Angeles, New York City, Philadelphia, San Diego, San Francisco | $225,000 | $235,000 |
| Middle band | Atlanta, Wilmington, Denver, Ft. Lauderdale, Miami, Nashville, Phoenix, Raleigh, Seattle, Salt Lake City, Park City | $215,000 | $225,000 |
| Kansas City band | Birmingham, Chattanooga, Charleston, Kansas City, St. Louis | $210,000 | $220,000 |
The major-office second year, $235,000, equals the 2026 market first-year. It does not mean those offices matched the July raise. It is the old market's second rung, still sitting on a first-year of $225,000. The Kansas City band is a flat $15,000 under the major-office cells at both published years. The middle band is a flat $10,000 under. Compression shows up only where the table goes blank.
Printed officeUnprinted year
- The two years you can print A first-year and a second-year, by city group. This is the only associate scale treated here as the firm's own.
- The bonus you cannot print No year-end dollar for 2025 or 2026 turned up in the legal press. An hours range is not a check.
- The match you cannot assume The 2026 market ladder exists. The firm is not named on the raise scorecard. That is a missing document.
Vault's 2027 profile, accessed the same day, prints a single first-year range of $210,000 to $225,000 and a summer weekly of $4,038 to $4,327. Those weekly figures annualize to $209,976 and $225,004, the same ends as the first-year range, at 52 weeks. Vault does not split the cities. Chambers does. Use Chambers when the seat has a city. Use Vault as the envelope, not as a third scale.
Ellis, republishing Department of Labor labor-condition filings and last updated August 2026, shows seven roles titled Associate Attorney: minimum $160,000, median $225,000, maximum $235,000. Seven filings are not a class-year grid. The $160,000 floor sits under every Chambers first-year band, so at least one sponsored associate-titled wage is not the Kansas City first-year. The $235,000 maximum is one offered wage. It is not a firm announcement that the July 2026 scale was matched. The location table on the same page mixes analysts, engineers, and clerks. Kansas City's row there tops out at $135,000 across four mixed roles. Do not read that row as associate pay.
| Figure | Public in 2026? | Document and date |
|---|---|---|
| 1st and 2nd year by office | Yes — Chambers row | Accessed 7 October 2026 |
| Years 3–8 base | Not printed | Chambers and Vault, same access date |
| 2026 raise match | Not named on the scorecard | Above the Law, accessed 7 October 2026 |
| 2025 or 2026 bonus $ | No memo located | Legal press, through 7 October 2026 |
| Associate-titled LCA wages | Yes — seven filings | Ellis, last updated August 2026 |
| 2025 gross revenue and profit | Yes | Missouri Lawyers Media, 10 June 2026 |
What a general counsel must actually bid
The associate is paid by the office. The general counsel who wants that lawyer on the payroll is bidding a title from the 2025 ACC survey, the latest edition published, against a first-year that is already public and a midlevel that is not.
The Association of Corporate Counsel 2025 Law Department Compensation Survey, 1,632 respondents, put U.S. attorney median base at $148,000 and senior-attorney median base at $201,000. A Kansas City first-year listed at $210,000 clears both. The gap versus the attorney median is $62,000. The gap versus the senior-attorney median is $9,000. An attorney-grade requisition does not hire this first-year. A senior-attorney requisition does not either, on base alone.
Move the office and the arithmetic flips at the first-year, then breaks again at the blank years. A New York City first-year at $225,000 still sits $20,000 under associate-general-counsel median base of $245,000, and under that title's median total cash of $294,000. Deputy-general-counsel median base is $280,000 and median total cash is $368,000. Those cells can talk to a published first-year or second-year. They cannot be checked against a fourth-year, because no fourth-year is public. NALP's June 2025 bulletin, salaries as of 1 January 2025, put the Midwest first-year median at $180,000 and the national median at $200,000. The Kansas City band is $30,000 above that Midwest median. NALP's city table does not include Kansas City, so the metro's own share at $225,000 is not in that release.
Kansas City band, 1st year
Chambers, accessed 7 October 2026. Also St. Louis, Birmingham, Chattanooga, Charleston.
Chambers associate salaries ↗The firm pays the officeThe company pays the title
- Payroll at the firm The associate earns the printed band for that city, plus a bonus that is not in a public memo.
- The panel invoice Healthcare, real estate, and midmarket deals stay outside until a named officer has to sign inside the building.
- The in-house offer Title has to clear the office band. A senior-attorney grade against a Kansas City first-year is how the first offer dies.
Price the city that is on the offer, then price the title.
- Name the office. A Kansas City first-year and a New York City first-year are $15,000 apart on the published row. One requisition that says “market” is wrong for at least one of them.
- Do not paste July. The $235,000 floor is Milbank's 2 June 2026 scale. It is not this firm's first-year in any city Chambers lists.
- Jump the title early. Senior-attorney median base loses to the Kansas City first-year. Associate general counsel is the first ACC title whose median base clears the major-office first-year.
- Stop at the blank year. If the candidate is past year two, you do not have a public base. Ask for the current base in writing. Do not invent the step.
Your city is the number the company can check. Your bonus is the number it cannot.
- Lead with the printed band. Chambers and Vault will confirm a first-year range. They will not confirm last year's bonus.
- Skip a guessed match. The scorecard accessed 7 October 2026 does not name the firm. The 2026 market first-year is not, on that record, your first-year.
- Expect a title change. Cash that clears a Kansas City first-year usually arrives above senior attorney. Cash that clears a major-office first-year usually arrives as associate general counsel.
- Treat the LCA as a filing. Seven associate-titled wages from August 2026 are not your class year. One of them is $160,000.
If the candidate is past year two, there is no public base to match.
Partner economics are a profit pool, not a paycheck
Associate bands are a document. Partner pay is a 2025 profit figure, a December headline, and a rank. None of the three is take-home, and none of them fills in year three.
Missouri Lawyers Media, on 10 June 2026, put Polsinelli's 2025 gross revenue at $1.21 billion, up $245.98 million, or 25.5 percent, and profit at $722 million, up 33.6 percent. The printed increase implies prior-year revenue of $964.02 million. In the same interview the chief executive compared the firm at $950 million with the firm at $1.2 billion. That is his rounding, not a second audited print. He also said the firm has about 1,200 lawyers, and that St. Louis and Kansas City remain central to the platform. Vault's profile still carries a 2024 attorney band of 1,000 to 1,500. The June remark and the 2024 band can both stand. They are not the same census.
The firm's own release of 15 April 2026 said it had moved to number 55 on the Am Law 100, four places above the prior year and 19 places above its rank a decade earlier. Vault's awards line still records number 59 for the 2025 Am Law 100, which is the rank the four-place jump leaves behind. The release names the practices attached to that climb: real estate, finance, health care, middle-market M&A, private equity, technology, and life sciences. It does not print revenue per lawyer or profits per equity partner.
Law.com, on 17 December 2025, ran a headline that the firm had crossed $1 billion of revenue and grown profits per equity partner to $3 million, with the increase described as nearly 26 percent. The lede attributed the year to data-center work and a second-half rise in midmarket deals. That article is six months earlier than the June print, and the June print does not restate a PEP dollar. Treat $3 million as a December headline, not as the equity-partner average a compensation committee can paste, and not as any partner's W-2. Vault counts 34 partners named in 2025. That is a class size, not an equity headcount. Dividing $722 million by 34 is not a PEP.
There is no sterling newly qualified figure. Vault lists 27 U.S. offices and no London office. The summer weekly and the first-year range are the non-associate cash the profile does print. The billable range is 1,800 to 2,000 hours, with an asterisk that sends the reader to the firm site. The firm site did not return a readable hours page on 7 October 2026. The asterisk stands. A bonus grid does not.
Healthcare, real estate, and a data-center year
The bands stay interesting to a general counsel because the work behind them is the work already on the panel: health care, real estate, finance, and midmarket deals, in a Missouri platform that now bills like a national firm.
The 15 April 2026 release ties the Am Law climb to those practices plus private equity, technology, and life sciences. Law.com's 17 December 2025 lede is more specific about the year: data-center work and a second-half rise in midmarket deal flow. A company that wants a lawyer off this platform is usually buying one of those desks, not a generic commercial seat. Vault's 2027 healthcare list ranks the firm eighth, and its about-text describes more than 200 people in intellectual property, counting attorneys, patent agents, and scientists, plus more than 40 IP trial lawyers. Those are practice-size claims on a career profile, not a payroll file.
The local wage context is a different instrument. The Bureau of Labor Statistics Mountain-Plains release for May 2025 put the Kansas City legal occupational group at a mean of $61.47 an hour, against a U.S. legal mean of $67.07. That group is not “lawyers” alone, and it is not an associate scale. It is the metro's legal payroll, and it sits $5.60 an hour under the national legal mean. A general counsel who benchmarks a $210,000 first-year against that hourly mean will conclude the firm is expensive and the metro is cheap. Both statements can be true. They do not price the offer.
NALP's January 2025 snapshot explains why the major-office band looks ordinary and the Kansas City band does not. As of 1 January 2025, $225,000 was the most common first-year figure, at 32 percent of offices and 44.7 percent of offices in firms of more than 700 lawyers, but the median was still $200,000 overall and $215,000 at those largest firms. The South and West median was $205,000. Cities where at least half of reporting offices paid $225,000 included several of this firm's major offices: Austin is not on the Chambers row, but Boston, Dallas, Houston, New York City, San Francisco, and Washington DC are. Nashville, on the middle band at $215,000, had zero of six NALP offices at $225,000. The firm's major-office first-year matches the figure NALP already called common. Its Kansas City first-year matches neither the Midwest median nor that $225,000 mode.
The chief executive told Missouri Lawyers Media that 2025's result came from earlier investment, including younger lawyers “hitting their stride,” and from artificial-intelligence work that improved efficiency and quality control without reducing the need for lawyers. That is a hiring sentence. The platform added profit without publishing a smaller associate grid. A company waiting for a 2026 pay cut tied to AI will not find it in that interview.
Panel workNamed-officer need
- The desks already billed Health care, real estate, finance, midmarket deals, data centers. The 2025 revenue print is the demand, not a mood.
- The city on the letter Kansas City and New York City are different first-years. The offer has to say which one.
- The in-house signature Title and cash have to clear the printed band. The unpublished year is a question, not a Cravath step.
What New York associate searches do with an office band
Sartori & Partners has worked the New York associate market for companies that need a lawyer on payroll and for firms that need an associate. The Polsinelli question shows up when the candidate's office is not the buyer's city.
Sartori & Partners has worked the New York associate market for more than 10 years. It maps 1,480,000+ lawyers and has run quarterly market surveys since 2019. The New York associate desk is one cut of that work. Sartori maps about 67,000 lawyers in New York. That file records employer and seniority. It does not record a Polsinelli bonus, because no public grid does.
Over the trailing three years the New York mandate record shows 33 closed associate searches, a 93 percent completion rate, a typical timeline of 6 to 12 weeks, a median 11 working days from offer to signature, and a 37 percent counter-offer incidence. Of those 33, 12 were company-side mandates to hire from a national platform that pays by office rather than one lockstep, in healthcare, real estate, or life sciences. 21 were firm-side seats. Of the 12 company-side files, 7 were years three to six.
Across 1675 structured interviews with New York associates and in-house counsel, 58 of 126 in-house hiring managers — general counsel, deputy general counsel, and heads of legal — over a 24-month window said they price an office-band associate against the senior-attorney cell, not against the July market floor. A general counsel at a Kansas City health system told us, “We can clear senior-attorney cash. We cannot clear a fourth-year from a $225,000 office without the associate general counsel title.” A deputy general counsel at a listed healthcare landlord told us, “We will keep the invoice on the portfolio deals. We will not open a senior-counsel seat priced at the Kansas City first-year.”
Sartori's quarterly survey, in the four waves from the first quarter of 2025 through the second quarter of 2026, found that 19 of 44 New York company respondents who had tried to hire an office-band midlevel onto an attorney grade reported the first cash offer rejected. The 11-day window is long enough for that rejection when the title was wrong, and short enough to sign when the title was associate general counsel and the cash was real.
4 of the 12 company-side files ran past 12 weeks. In 2 of those 4, the search stayed open after the compensation committee had already refused an associate-general-counsel title. Both closed only in week 14, after the committee reversed. That delay is on us. The method does not get faster than a buyer who will not write the title.
Three files from the same 33, described by sector and city only.
- Healthcare platform, associate counsel. The brief was a healthcare regulatory associate in Kansas City, on the $210,000 band, to own physician-practice and reimbursement work. The file closed in 10 weeks. The firm counter-offered. The candidate signed on day 11, once the title was associate general counsel and total cash met the ACC associate-general-counsel median. A senior-attorney draft of the same seat had died in week 3.
- Listed landlord, real-estate counsel. The general counsel wanted a lawyer from a major office on the $225,000 band, for portfolio acquisitions, not a staff attorney on vendor contracts. The file closed in 8 weeks. Base alone did not clear the office. Equity did.
- The hospital file stalled. The head of legal wanted a fifth-year and would not leave senior-attorney cash. No public fifth-year existed to anchor the ask. The file is one of the two that reached week 14. It closed when the title moved, not when a memo appeared. We should have said so in week 2.
The company-side book sits on in-house counsel recruiting. Healthcare cash, separate from this firm's bands, sits on healthcare attorney salary. The Missouri platform with a different public-pay problem sits on Husch Blackwell salary. The July ladder these bands did not publish sits on the 2026 BigLaw associate scale.
Polsinelli salary: what is public in 2026, from both sides of the offer
What is the Polsinelli salary for associates in 2026?
Polsinelli salary for a first-year is $210,000, $215,000, or $225,000 by office. Chambers' associate comparison, accessed 7 October 2026, stops at year two. Above the Law's 2026 raise scorecard, accessed the same day, does not name the firm. A year-three figure is not public and is not estimated here.
Did Polsinelli match the 2026 associate raise?
Polsinelli is not named on Above the Law's 2026 raise scorecard, accessed 7 October 2026. Milbank set the market at $235,000 to $455,000 on 2 June 2026, effective 1 July 2026. Absence from that list is a missing memo, not a published refusal.
What do Polsinelli associates earn in Kansas City versus New York?
Kansas City and St. Louis first-years are listed at $210,000; New York City is listed at $225,000. Second years on the same Chambers row are $220,000 and $235,000. The $15,000 gap is the published spread. It is not a full class-year scale.
What bonus does Polsinelli pay associates?
No 2025 or 2026 Polsinelli bonus dollar turned up in the legal press. Vault's 2027 profile lists a billable range of 1,800 to 2,000 hours and points the asterisk at the firm site. Hours are not a bonus check.
What is Polsinelli partner pay in 2026?
2025 profit was $722 million, up 33.6 percent, and exact partner take-home is not public. Missouri Lawyers Media printed that pool on 10 June 2026. A 17 December 2025 Law.com headline said PEP had grown to $3 million. That headline is not a W-2.
What must a general counsel offer to hire a Polsinelli associate?
A Kansas City first-year base of $210,000 already exceeds the 2025 ACC attorney median of $148,000 and the senior-attorney median of $201,000. An associate-general-counsel median base of $245,000 still clears a New York first-year at $225,000. The break is the unpublished midlevel, not the first-year.
The office table, the survey, and the June print.
First-year bands come from the Chambers comparison accessed 7 October 2026. In-house medians come from the Association of Corporate Counsel. Revenue and profit come from Missouri Lawyers Media. What is missing is listed as missing.
Sources and further reading
13 references- Sartori & Partners — New York Legal Talent Research Program (1675 structured interviews; ~67000 lawyers mapped; quarterly surveys since 2019; mandate telemetry) sartoriglobal.com ↗
- Law firm salaries compared (Chambers Associate) chambers.com ↗
- Polsinelli company profile (Vault, 2027 rankings edition) legacy.vault.com ↗
- Polsinelli H-1B salaries (Ellis, DOL LCA republication) ellis.com ↗
- Am Law 100 Firm Announces Raises To $170K-$200K, Depending On Market abovethelaw.com ↗
- Associate Compensation Scorecard: The 2026 Summer Of Salary Increases abovethelaw.com ↗
- ALERT: Milbank Does It Again — Associate Salaries Are Going Up!!! abovethelaw.com ↗
- Revenue growth continues for Missouri's largest law firms molawyersmedia.com ↗
- Fueled by Sustained Growth, Polsinelli Soars in Am Law 100 Rankings polsinelli.com ↗
- Polsinelli Eclipses $1B Revenue Mark, Grows PEP to $3M law.com ↗
- $225,000 Entry-Level Salaries Not Yet the Standard at Large Firms nalp.org ↗
- 2025 Law Department Compensation Survey Executive Summary acc.com ↗
- Occupational Employment and Wages in Kansas City — May 2025 bls.gov ↗
Associate bands are the Chambers row accessed 7 October 2026, checked against Vault's $210,000–$225,000 first-year envelope. The $235,000–$455,000 ladder is Milbank's 2 June 2026 market scale, used only as a bound. Seven Associate Attorney LCA wages are Ellis's August 2026 cut of Department of Labor filings, not a class-year grid. In-house medians are the ACC 2025 survey. The $1.21 billion and $722 million figures are Missouri Lawyers Media, 10 June 2026. The $3 million PEP figure is a Law.com headline of 17 December 2025 and is not restated in that June print.
Our own numbers — the New York interview cohort, the associate-line mandate record, the counter-offer incidence, and the offer-to-acceptance window — come from the research program described on our research page.
Adjacent numbers for the same two readers.
Healthcare cash, the other Missouri platform, and the market ladder this firm has not published.
Healthcare attorney salary 2026
The in-house and lockstep tables a general counsel uses when the seat is healthcare regulatory, not a compliance-officer band.
Read healthcare attorney pay Missouri platformHusch Blackwell salary 2026
The other large Missouri platform in the same 10 June 2026 revenue ranking, with a different public-pay problem: two LCAs, not three office bands.
Read Husch Blackwell pay Market lockstepBigLaw associate salary scale 2026
The $235,000 to $455,000 ladder Milbank set on 2 June 2026. A bound on what Polsinelli has not published, not a Polsinelli memo.
Read the market scaleA quiet conversation
Pricing an office-band lawyer on an in-house offer?
We tell a general counsel when the title will not clear the city on the letter, and we tell an associate when the company is buying an invoice rather than a seat. Confidential, no obligation.