The average pay for junior City staff has risen aggressively over the summer, according to Astbury Marsden, a financial services recruitment firm.
Average base salaries for City workers at assistant vice president level have increased by 12% from £62,945 to £70,480 over the last year.
Up until the last three months more junior staff have seen their pay lag behind that of senior City staff, with increases averaging between 20% and 50%, much of that as part of a shift away from bonuses.
Jonathan Nicholson, managing director at Astbury Marsden, said: “Up to now the big jumps in pay created by the recovery in City recruitment have gone to the more senior staff.
“The salary inflation largely passed junior staff by but now those lower down the pyramid are starting to see their wages grow significantly.
Nicholson adds that the wage increases are not taking place through company-wide pay rises but through a series of one-off pay increases either to attract or retain individuals and teams.
“The junior staff have been pretty much ignored up until six months ago and whilst all the banks are looking at keeping their compensation ratio lean they need to deal with a rise in business volume as summer ends,” he says.
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