Guiding Principles:

We have adopted this unique compensation policy with the following goals in mind:

1)      To create a more just society. We recognize that the compensation people receive for work is – to a significant degree – determined by factors that have little to do with how hard a person has worked in their lives, what hurdles they have overcome, what their individual needs are, or the value that a person contributes to the world. Rather, incomes are determined by a market that privileges people of particular races, nationalities, genders, socio-economic status, social connections, and access to higher education. Furthermore, the market is driven by the creation of artificial scarcities that allow people to get rich by controlling resources, making the resources expensive to some, and denying access to others. For example, scarcity of affordable legal services is maintained by the widespread expectation that lawyers should make, on average, $135,000. It would be harmful for the Law Center to simply play into that marketplace and to reward ourselves for occupying a privileged position in that marketplace. We want to create an economy outside of the unjust market.

2)      To expand access to legal services. The majority of people in the U.S. cannot afford to hire lawyers, because lawyers have carved out a very elite position for themselves in society.  If lawyers were to have incomes closer to that of the average person, legal services would become affordable to the average person.

3)      To create jobs. We want to live in a world without unemployment and in a world where people do not need to work for free in order to gain opportunities. At the Law Center, we can create more jobs by ensuring that funding we receive will prioritize the creation of new positions in the organization, rather than raising compensation of existing staff.

4)      To do work in service of our mission. Time spent on fundraising largely takes away from time we could spend doing the work that serves our mission and vision. As such, we want to avoid the burden of raising funds to support high salaries.

5)      To have a balanced relationship with our donors. It would be difficult to ask average or low income people to donate to the Law Center if their donation would go to fund salaries that are much higher than average, so that staff could enjoy a higher standard of living than our donors.

6)      To create a sense of “ownership” among staff. We want to avoid creation of a top-heavy organization where some staff feel that they are working hard in order to raise funds to support higher-paid staff. Adopting equal pay rates helps everyone feel that they are being equally rewarded for their work, and will encourage a sense of equal accountability for work.

7)      To focus on the non-monetary benefits that we provide to staff. We strive to make jobs at the Law Center enjoyable, rewarding, and stimulating. By adopting a semi-holacratic governance model, we strive to give all staff members power in the organization and power over their own work and working conditions.  We also strive to cultivate leadership, practical skills, recognition, and professional connections for all staff members, which significantly increases each staff members’ “social capital.” The vast majority of higher-paying organizations fall very short in providing these benefits and opportunities to staff. There is also a lot of chocolate at staff meetings.

8)      To be the change we want to see in the world. One of the Law Center's purposes to improve the economic well-being of average-income and lower-income people by opening doors to alternative livelihoods, new forms of production, new ways of obtaining sustenance, and new ways of building local economic ecosystems through sharing, bartering, micro-enterprise, and so on. Staff members can “walk that talk” if we show that we, too, can thrive on average incomes.

9)     To start with equal pay, then strive for equitable pay. We believe equal pay for all staff is an essential foundation for compensation when, historically and structurally, pay differences have generally mirrored dynamics of oppression, disenfranchisement, and marginalization in society. Nevertheless, when people face different challenges, both historic and present, addressing systems of oppression and individuals’ different circumstances requires a commitment to equity, not just equality. Therefore, we start with equal pay rates as a profound alternative to the inequities of the labor market and continue to evolve our compensation practices as we find sound methods for considering equitable variations in pay. 

To achieve the above goals and to prevent the temptation to raise salaries simply due to market rates, bargaining power, and access to funds, we believe that it is important to cap salaries by correlating them to an objective measure.  

Compensation Policy:

In an effort to achieve the above goals, SELC adopts the following compensation policy:

Salary Calculator: Use this form and calculator to determine staff wages. The calculator takes into account family size, dependents, and cost of living. The MIT cost of living accounts for 70% of our local base salaries (the “living:thriving ratio”), and then costs for childcare and dependents are added as applicable at 100% of MIT-indicated costs.

Salary Floor: All staff will receive at least $72,502 FTE. The salary floor will adjust annually by the annual Consumer Price Index for All Urban Consumers as determined by the Bureau of Labor Statistics. 

Annual Adjustments: Annually, we shall automatically adjust all columns tied to the MIT living wage calculator (including "Cost of Basic Needs," "Area cost of child care", and "Area cost of supporting a human") to match MIT living wage updates. The salary team will send a message to all staff over Slack notifying them that new MIT data has come out at least two weeks prior to implementing such automatic adjustments in order to provide time for any staff to bring a proposal to intervene in the automatic adjustment process. If the updated total annual estimated cost of staff wages increases by more than  10% compared with the total annual estimated cost just prior to the adjustment , GC must review and approve any increases beyond [an] automatic 10% increase.  If the GC determines that SELC cannot afford to take the full adjustment, it should consider changing the living:thriving ratio (e.g., raising it from 70% to 73%) across the board. Any annual automatic adjustments done under this policy will be backdated to January 1st of that year.

Adjustments based on life circumstances: Individual salaries get adjusted for the next pay period when life circumstances change, such as having children or supporting other adults. Employees are required to create an external request task in the Financial Circle's Asana space within 30 days of any changes affecting their wage calculation.  If an employee fails to notify of a pay reduction, the Law Center reserves the right to reduce that employee's future wages to make up for any overpaid wages. The Law Center will not adjust/ make back-dated wage increases for a wage increase for an employee who fails to to report eligibility for a wage increase within 30 days. That delayed notification wage increase will only be paid on a going forward basis. If an employee is unclear about a question having to do with the wage calculator the IR circle will deliberate and find solutions. PROCESS: Create an external request task in the Financial Circle's Asana space, tag all FC members, and the Financial Circle will process the adjustments in a timely manner. FC is empowered to define the process of implementing this.

Benefit Policies That Take Individual Staff Needs Into Account: To ensure that anyone can work at SELC regardless of class background, educational debt levels, disability or health condition, desire to birth/adopt/foster a child, and so on, SELC should strive to adopt additional policies that provide additional support to staff who:

• Have high medical expenses

• Have high educational debt

• Are supporting an elderly or particularly low-income family member

• Have, adopt, or foster children

Opting to reduce salary and donate to an aligned org: A Law Center staff may opt to reduce their salary and direct that the amount of the total reduction for the calendar year be donated to one or more organizations that the staff member chooses. Any coworker who opts to waive any compensation under the worker self-directed compensation policy and who wants the funds to go to an organization or project outside of SELC must bring a proposal to a Circle at SELC to integrate feedback on how and where such waived compensation will be spent or donated. Particularly if the donation will be to an organization we don't yet have a relationship with, staff are encouraged to gather feedback from the most relevant Program Circle. If it's an organization we already work with, bringing a proposal to the Financial Circle is fine. The general intent is for a worker to have influence and to direct the use of those funds as they feel inspired, while balancing in that it's still necessary that funds be spent in alignment with SELC's mission, to avoid private benefit and inurement, and to avoid the waived compensation being so much under the control of the worker as to be viewed as income to them. Thus, integrating feedback and capturing notes from a relevant Circle is important. The Circle will communicate the decision to the Financial Circle, which has final authority to approve or disapprove, and which will keep records of the decision and administer payment. If a staff member waives a lump sum, they may bring the proposal and have it paid out any time. If the staff member waives an ongoing salary increase, the payment(s) will be made at the end of the year, based on the total amount waived, or sooner if the Financial Circle has capacity to administer payouts more frequently. The Financial Circle will determine the best approach for budgeting for the potential donations of waived salary amounts, but we will not treat this as a form of liability on our books, because it will not become an obligation until the final approval by the Financial Circle. 

Worker self-directed compensation

Purpose: The purpose of Worker self-directed compensation is to give each staff member a greater degree of self-determination in balancing their own compensation needs with the needs of people working in alignment with us.

1. Opting to reduce salary and donate to an aligned org: A Law Center staff may opt to reduce their salary and direct that the amount of the total reduction for the calendar year be donated to one or more organizations that the staff member chooses. 

2. Law Center donation match in lieu of retirement match: If a staff member chooses not to contribute to any Law Center retirement plan, thereby opting out of any match the Law Center may provide, the Law Center will match the staff member’s salary reduction donation up to the amount the Law Center would have matched in the retirement fund. 

3. Administration: The Financial Circle must approve any donation, independently determining that the donation advances the Law Center’s tax exempt purposes. The Financial Circle may create other processes and criteria to ensure that these gifts are made with administrative ease, in alignment with our mission, and in compliance with the law. This may include a minimum donation amount (such as $1,000), a cap on the number of donations any staff member can make per year (such as 2), and a specified timeframe in which such donations can be made (such as only in January following the calendar year of the salary reduction).

See how to implement worker self-directed compensation here. 

Update log:

• Updated June 4, 2025 - updated text of Salary Calculator, Salary Floor and replaced Annual Increases with Annual Adjustments pursuant to "PROPOSAL: Amend Salary Calculator" passed on May 13, 2025.

• Updated May 31st, 2023 - added link to how to implement worker self-directed compensation.

• Updated June 1st, 2022 - added salary floor annual increase and linked the 2022 wage calculator. 

• Updated May 19th, 2022 - adding worker self-directed compensation 

• Updated February 23rd, 2022 - including that any annual automatic increases to compensation will be backdated to January 1st of that year.

• Updated January 8th, 2021 - the compensation policy from this Base Salary proposal and this wage calculator proposal.

• Updated August 10, 2022 - clarifying staff must report adjustments to wage calculator based on life circumstances within 30 days of the change per this proposal.

• Updated August 19, 2022 - adding section on opting to reduce salary and donate to an aligned org from this original proposal and this clarifying proposal.