When it comes to year-end associate bonuses, it appears the legal industry’s top tier still follows Cravath, Swaine & Moore.

In the wake of Monday’s announcement that Cravath would dole out more extra cash to its 372 junior lawyers in 2012 than it did in 2011, The Am Law Daily wondered whether other large law firms would soon follow suit as usual—or hold back amid what industry watchers predict will, in general, prove to be an anemic year on the revenue front.

A dozen Am Law 100 firms were mostly mum in response to our initial inquiries on the subject. As of Thursday, however, four of those firms—Paul, Weiss, Rifkind, Wharton & Garrison; Proskauer Rose; Simpson Thacher & Bartlett; and Skadden, Arps, Slate, Meagher & Flom—had informed their associates that history would indeed be repeating itself this year and that they would be matching the bonus scale established by Cravath.

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