After more than two years of hefty pay increases, lawyers at firms in Australia should expect much more modest raises in the next 12 months, lawyers and recruiters say.

Salaries for lawyers who work at law firms in Australia rose nearly 20% over the past two years as firms competed for talent in a tight labor market. Last year, lawyers with four and five years of experience could “literally pick where they wanted to go and firms would be falling over themselves to hire them,” said Sam Gray, a director of legal recruiter Montgomery.