All told, 27 firms earned at least $1 billion in 2014, the publication said, up from 23 in the prior year. The list also illustrated a growing gap between those who occupy the upper echelon of the legal field, and those at the bottom. The top 20 legal firms earned more than $30 billion collectively, nearly four times the revenues of the bottom 20—which pulled in less than $8 billion altogether.  "Even at the bottom of this list nobody is poor," said Kim Kleman, editor in chief of The American Lawyer, in an interview, who added that mergers and acquisitions deals and technology financing were two specialties that helped buttress law firm profits this year.  Elite firms such as Latham tend to serve as advisors in M&A deals, a highly lucrative market that surged to $3.5 trillion total in 2014, up 47 percent from the prior year.  After the 2008 crisis, even big law firms were forced to retrench, but began expanding their ranks once the recession abated.  "At the top of the list … are the firms getting the elite work," Kleman said. "It's less price sensitive than commodity work. Law firms at top still have to cut deals with clients," but less so than those firms at the bottom, she added, "because only two or three firms are able to pull off the work because the deals are so complicated."  Still, AmLaw's data comes at a time when a growing body of evidence suggests recent law school graduates are having a difficult time finding work. Yet for partners at the top firms, things appear just fine: AmLaw's rankings showed average profits per partner gained by 5.3 percent to $1.5 million, while average revenue per lawyer rose 3.7 percent.
A wealth inequality effect is underway at elite law firms, an industry that's hardly poor but is seeing a gap between the haves and have mores.