Tort Reform is an Elitist Sham
Promoted by CEOs Who Can't
Identify With the Rest of Society
By C. David Fonvielle, Firm Partner
We have all heard and read about the "plague" of lawsuits which are being blamed for a large number of America's economic problems.
We read and hear that "runaway" verdicts threaten the existence of America's industries, hamper the development of new products and interfere with free enterprise.
We are told that the answer is simply to put caps (limits) on the amount of damages that can be awarded by a jury to a person injured as a result of someone else's negligence.
The cap being suggested for jury awards is for pain and suffering and is $250,000. We need to understand that "pain and suffering" includes not only compensation for the pain and suffering caused by a debilitating injury, but also includes compensation for physical disfigurement, disability and the loss of ability to enjoy life.
It is interesting to note that the architects of this $250,000 pain and suffering cap are virtually all CEO's of America's largest corporations. You may not hear their names, but they are the ones paying the lobbyists in Washington. One must wonder how a person who has struggled and worked his way to the prestigious position of being CEO of a company like Ford Motor Company or Phillip Morris can justify a $250,000 cap on pain and suffering.
The answer is straightforward. There is no effort under way by any of the tort reform proponents to cap economic damages such as lost income or medical expenses. This means that the proponents of tort reform are silently protecting the areas of the legal system which protect them while attacking the area which protects the majority of individuals who seek redress through our courts.
To demonstrate what I am referring to, let's take a situation where two individuals are riding in a commercial airliner and the airliner crashes due to negligence of the pilot. One of the individuals was the CEO of American International Group Insurance Company (a real U.S. corporation), and the other was a individual earning $7.50 per hour as a laborer who was flying home to see his family for the holidays. Both individuals were 40 years old and received the same injuries in the accident, and unfortunately both individuals were rendered permanently and totally disabled and never able to work again for the rest of their lives. Both are the same age and both received severe disfigurement and disability as a result of the crash and both will be confined to wheelchairs for the rest of their lives.
The first area of damages we will evaluate will be for pain, suffering, mental anguish and physical disfigurement. Assuming that the $250,000 pain and suffering cap is in effect in this situation, each individual would receive $250,000 for pain, suffering, mental anguish, physical disfigurement, and loss of the enjoyment of life for the rest of their lives. Based on these individual's ages, that works out to about $7,150 per year. That obviously is not fair compensation for the losses these two individuals have incurred.
How could someone intelligent enough to be CEO of a billion dollar corporation justify this meaningless amount of compensation for this great loss?
The answer is easy when you look to the rest of the damage equation for these two individuals. Under the tort reform plan both of our airline passengers are entitled to be reimbursed equally and in full for their "economic" losses. This includes medical expenses incurred and income lost as a result of this accident.
This final element of economic damages is the one that protects our tort reform proponent from the unfairness of the cap on pain and suffering. Since neither of our passengers will ever be able to work again during their lives, they must both be reimbursed for their lost incomes. Our passenger who was the CEO of American International Group Insurance Company will receive more than $100,000,000 (one hundred million dollars) to compensate him for the loss of his annual income of $12,080,000 which he received in 1994 (actual figure). Our passenger who was earning $7.50 per hour in 1994 will receive approximately $150,000 to compensate him for his lost earnings for the rest of his life.
The bottom line is our passenger who was the CEO of the big corporation is receiving a total of more than $100,250,000 which includes the capped pain and suffering amount of $250,000, while our passenger who earned $7.50 per hour will receive a total of approximately $400,000 including the $250,000 amount for pain and suffering.
I don't have to tell you who loses and who wins in this situation. If tort reform passes and a cap goes into effect on pain and suffering, corporate profits will soar and corporate salaries will increase proportionately. Our CEO passenger in this example then gets even more from his lawsuit. There will be less concern by manufacturers and insurance companies for safety because their profits are safe from "run-away" verdicts while their individual benefits available from our legal system are secure.
The lady who holds the scales of justice at the U.S. Supreme Court is blindfolded to guarantee that this injustice will not occur.
Tort reform is nothing more than an attempt by an elite group to tilt those scales unfairly in their direction. We can prevent this by steadfastly refusing to compromise the rights of those injured by another's negligence.
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Fonvielle
Lewis Foote & Messer
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