The news from the US is the same as the UK….
Here are a selection of the reports we’ve seen this past week
Fenwick & West Cuts Staff Positions
The Recorder
Fenwick & West laid off 36 staff on Thursday, and said it was freezing associate salaries for the upcoming year.
But unlike every other major San Francisco Bay Area law firm, including Silicon Valley rivals Cooley Godward Kronish and Wilson Sonsini Goodrich & Rosati, it did not cut attorneys
http://www.law.com/jsp/article.jsp?id=1202427874876
200 Lose Jobs at Morrison & Foerster
The Recorder
The bad news continues for San Francisco Bay Area associates and legal staffers.
San Francisco giant Morrison & Foerster cut 53 lawyers and 148 staff Wednesday, adding to the mounting toll of out-of-work legal professionals.
The firm issued a statement saying the layoffs were meant "to align our firm with client needs in this extraordinary economic downturn." Associates and staff from around the country at all levels of seniority were affected by the cuts, firm sources said. More than 5 percent of the firm’s 1,000 attorneys were laid off.
http://www.law.com/jsp/article.jsp?id=1202427831505
Ropes & Gray cutting 106 staffers
Boston Business Journal – by Lisa van der Pool
Law firm Ropes & Gray LLP has cut 106 non-legal staff members, or 10 percent of its non-lawyer staff, the firm’s chairman Brad Malt confirmed Thursday.
In a memo to the firm, Malt blamed the cuts on a host of economic pressures affecting the Boston-based firm’s clients.
“Our clients and marketplace have been seriously affected by the continuing global economic downturn, and the recession is now widely seen as the most serious since the 1930s,” wrote Malt.
http://www.bizjournals.com/boston/stories/2009/01/26/daily66.html
Fish & Richardson cutting 30 staffers
Boston Business Journal – by Lisa van der Pool
Law firm Fish & Richardson P.C. has laid off 30 support staff across its eight U.S. offices, the firm confirmed Thursday.
Attorneys were not part of the cuts at the Boston-based law firm, which has about 87 lawyers in Massachusetts and a total of 450 lawyers across the country. The firm said 11 staffers in Boston will be cut.
http://www.bizjournals.com/boston/stories/2009/01/26/daily55.html
