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When it comes to law firm profits, the richest firms are breathing increasingly rarefied air. But despite eye-popping numbers at the top last year, growth in Am Law 100 profits was actually, for once, more egalitarian.

The American Lawyer's early reports on 2018 financials showed Kirkland & Ellis and Paul, Weiss, Rifkind, Wharton & Garrison surpassing $5 million in profits per equity partner, and more firms reaching $4 million than ever before. A full 20 firms last year registered at least $3 million in PEP, up from 16 a year ago. Welcome to the club Fried, Frank, Harris, Shriver & Jacobson; Debevoise & Plimpton; Paul Hastings; and Weil, Gotshal & Manges.

But the celebration isn't limited to those firms. The growth in wealth among the Am Law 100 last year was more evenly distributed than in recent years, buoyed by arguably the healthiest market for Big Law services since the Great Recession.

Yes, the richest firms continued to get richer than the rest; but just barely. Most firms—the middle 60 when ranked by last year's 2017 PEP, in fact—grew their partners' profits last year at a rate similar to the richest firms, according to an analysis of ALM data. In 2018, the top of the profitability pack didn't so much break away from the crowd as the back of the pack fell further away.

The firms that comprised last year's Am Law 100 increased their PEP in 2018 on average by 6.7 percent, according to preliminary ALM data. The firms that last year ranked No. 1 to No. 20 by PEP saw that figure rise on average by 7.7 percent. The bottom 20? They grew PEP by 3.8 percent.

But the rich-get-richer dynamic has been seen for years. So, what may have been more surprising in last year's results was that the vast middle of the Am Law 100—the firms ranking from No. 21 to No. 60 by last year's PEP rankings—grew their profits at roughly the same pace as the 20 richest firms. The middle 60 had a growth rate of 7.4 percent, less than a half percent difference from the Top 20.

Objectively, that means there are more partners with more reasons to celebrate a healthy year's performance. But underneath that veneer of short-term success, at most firms, there is a simmering anxiety produced by ever-higher top-end profit numbers.

Can one year of relatively similar growth reasonably be considered a bulwark against star-poaching in an environment where the highest profit firms make more than twice the Am Law 100 average of just north of $2 million?

Opinions on that question range from gloomy (last year would be too little too late) to sanguine: The comparison is moot because the middle group of firms are not competing in the same talent market as the richest firms.

“One robin doesn't make a spring,” said James Jones, a senior fellow at the Center for the Study of the Legal Profession at Georgetown University Law Center. “I think most firms should feel lucky about their performance this past year.”

Still, other industry watchers and some law firm leaders say that most Am Law 100 firms are not broadly threatened by firms where partner compensation is a matter of multiples higher. Those firms are competing for different types of matters and different types of talent than the vast majority of firms.

There are about 15 firms competing for the highest-end legal matters that must pay the highest prices to attract the best talent, said Bruce MacEwen and Janet Stanton of law firm business consultancy Adam Smith Esq.

“Most of the Am Law 100 firms are not really in the arms race for the elite talent that Kirkland and Paul Weiss are going for, frankly,” MacEwen said. “And they are kidding themselves if they think otherwise. They don't need to pay $5 million. They're not going to attract someone who is worth $5 million.”

Thomas Fitzgerald, chairman of Winston & Strawn, where PEP came in last year at $2.16 million, said firms with $5 million in PEP are not his primary competition for lateral hires. But the fight for talent is also very competitive among Winston's peer firms, Fitzgerald said. He said the firm has stuck to its own formula to compensate potential laterals for what the firm believes they are worth, and that has led to the firm walking away from some deals and some prospects going elsewhere.

“If somebody will go to Paul Weiss for the money, they're not going to come to Winston,” Fitzgerald said. “Is it a concern? Of course it's a concern. But I don't think it is our primary competition.”

He added: “It's competitive. But we've gotten our fair share.”

Asked about feeling pressure to keep pace with the richest firms, Larren Nashelsky, chair of Morrison & Foerster, where PEP was just shy of $2 million last year, said, “We are not in an economic arms race with other firms. We really are focused on improving our own performance while staying true to being the place we are.”

Still, Georgetown's Jones said there's no ignoring that in the long term, more and more star partners will migrate toward the largest, richest firms.

“Sooner or later you just are not going to be able to keep that person,” he said.

The impacts of a widening gap in profitability are felt most acutely at law firms that are both smaller and less profitable than the firms at the top of the pack, said Kent Zimmermann, a principal at The Zeughauser Group. Those firms, which may have developed a specialty practice that has commanded relatively higher rates, have a smaller profit pool to stretch as a way to entice their top-billers to stay.

“This small but growing group of firms with $5 million in profits per equity partner brings into focus the increasingly competitive environment for sought-after people,” Zimmermann said. “It just shows how challenging it is going to be for firms to keep up with firms that are double or more of their profitability if they want to go after the same talent.”