Lawyers salary in Maine

Maine lawyers earned a median annual wage of $100,340 in 2024. That sits about 33% below the US median of $149,496, one of the larger state-level gaps we see for this occupation across the country.

The spread within Maine tells its own story. At the 10th percentile, lawyers earned $59,370. At the 90th, they earned $209,920. Top earners make roughly 3.5 times what those at the bottom do, which reflects how much variation exists by practice area, firm size, and years in the field. A solo practitioner doing rural estate work and a corporate attorney at a Portland firm both show up in that range.

Cost of living barely moves the needle here. Maine's price index sits at 99.1, almost exactly the national baseline, so the nominal gap and the real gap are nearly identical. The $49,000 shortfall against the national median is not softened much by cheaper housing or groceries. What you see is close to what you get.

BLS projects lawyer employment to grow 4.2% between 2024 and 2034, which it categorizes as average. That matches the pace expected for most professional occupations over the same period. Maine's legal market is smaller at 2,080 employed lawyers statewide, so even modest growth translates to a limited number of new positions in absolute terms.

The wage gap relative to the national figure likely reflects Maine's economic mix. The state has a smaller concentration of the high-billing practice areas, such as corporate law, finance, and complex litigation, that push national averages up. Regional and public-sector legal work, which tends to pay less, makes up a larger share of the local market.