Posted on 03/13/2006 5:25:41 AM PST by Brilliant
It's easy to raise the blood pressure of an American chief executive. Just talk about rising tort costs... The tort system is designed to compensate people who feel they've been wronged... But the extremes of litigation and the volume of lawsuits considered frivolous drive CEOs nuts.
That's why a new report by consulting firm Tillinghast ...is bound to get some attention... For 20 years, Tillinghast, an insurance-industry consulting firm, has been putting an often-criticized dollar value on what it calls the cost of the nation's tort system...
The latest study puts the cost in 2004 at $260 billion, almost equal to the annual sales of Wal-Mart -- nearly $900 for every man, woman and small child... It projects that cost will rise to nearly $315 billion by 2007...
Tillinghast's calculations get lots of attention in Washington, where the Bush administration has used the figures as a rallying cry to reform the nation's tort system, lamenting the "deadweight losses" to the economy. "The U.S. tort liability system is the most expensive in the world, more than double the average cost of other industrialized nations that have been studied," the Council of Economic Advisers said...
But here's the problem: critics of past years' studies -- and there are many -- say the number and the projections that come with it are deeply flawed. For instance, they include payments that don't involve the legal system at all. Say somebody smashes his car into the back of your new SUV and his insurance company sends you a $5,000 check to fix the damage. That gets counted as a tort cost in Tillinghast's number. Critics say it's just a transfer payment from somebody who wasn't driving carefully to somebody who has been legitimately wronged. How is that evidence of a system run amok?...
(Excerpt) Read more at online.wsj.com ...
There should be a direct cause and effect between a persons action and the harm done to someone else before the first person is forced to pay compensation.
Further, if the circumstanse are such that it was such a rare combination of events that no one could have anticipated then no one should be blamed for the event.
Finally if the harmed individual actually put in motion the events that resulted in their harm (usually by doing something stupid, or contrary to good sense) there should never be any compensation for their injury.
Last, hold lawyers accountable for false claims and frivilous lawsuits. Perhaps they should out of their own pockets pay the defendant if they bring a suit that has no merit.
I am.
Tort law is about making lawyers rich. It's about legal fees and not about making the injured party "whole again."
Life is inherently risky and our legal system has evolved into the fiction if bad things happen, it's always somebody's fault and they have to pay...dearly!
The problem is we are ALL paying dearly!
Nobody forces you to go to a doctor. If the doctor makes a mistake, why do you get to sue him for a ton of money?
If you are hurt in an accident on the Interstate highway, who forced you to be there? Who told you driving was guaranteed to be safe?
Tort law is a scam the benefits lawyers mostly.
If the judges would develop a backbone and throw these cases out before they get to trial, it would not be such a big deal. The problem is that judges take the view that a jury must decide every case, no matter how absurd.
Hmmm... well that would be the end of the insurance industry if you could not sue anyone. I don't think that is necessary. We've had a tort system in this country since its founding. It's only become a problem in recent years as the activists have used it to redistribute wealth.
Lawyer for insurance company evaluating case: He/she has bad injuries.
Lawyer for injured person: He/she had good injuries.
I don't have a subscription but that first example is obviously a red herring. The real costs of litigation show up in products we can't buy anymore, and not just lawn darts. The tort system also burdens us with useless warning labels, excessive protective packaging, and other stuff that wastes time and costs money.
Not entirely, my mom got into a 50/50 fault accident with another woman who had the same insurance. The insurance companies paid for both repairs.
And, the downside....?
This is something that seems to have dropped off of Bush's radar, I guess he's busy with other things.
Critics say it's just a transfer payment from somebody who wasn't driving carefully to somebody who has been legitimately wronged.
Interesting statement.................
"$400.00 per hour is a lot of money for aggressive big mouth lawyers.".....And that's 'chickenfeed' to the Wash. DC tribe of lawyers.....Where is Ol' Will?????
Probably because the the clear language of the 7th amendment,
"In Suits at common law, where the value in controversy shall exceed twenty dollars, the right of trial by jury shall be preserved.."
means that summary disposition is dangerous tool, one that must be used very judiaciously.
True story-a buddy asked me to cover an arb for him. Someone was suing a theme park because he was bit by a bat. Like an idiot, I assumed there was some basis for his claim. I figured there was a South African Fruit Bat exhibit or something and one got out and bit the guy. It turns out it was just a random bat. It was probably sick and disoriented and was out during the day. I was livid-what was the theme park supposed to do- Install anti-aircraft batteries, build a dome?
The carrier paid a couple of grand to make it go away because it was not worth the cost of defending.
Back in E. TX they called these kinds of lawsuits the Redneck Lottery. Seems like every other person had sued someone and won some settlement.
susie
this is a tax
this tax replaces many jobs
I agree. And juries think, well it is not my money, so why not. Why not indeed. They will pay as well in the form of either higher cost, or a service no longer provided.
A capitalist favoring price controls? Haven't seen this since President Nixon.
By the way, what should a lawyer make; bus driver, doctor, house painter, nurse, stock broker....?
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