Tort reform is any attempt to reduce or limit the ability of an injured party to seek compensation in a civil lawsuit. Individuals in favor of tort reform argue that limitations placed on civil wrongs help reduce the glut of frivolous lawsuits that occur each year. They also see tort reform as a way to reduce high costs associated with the U.S. tort system and claim that tort reform will reduce the cost consumers pay for insurance, health care and products.
While reducing the number of frivolous lawsuits and lowering court system costs are, indeed, good ideas, that doesn’t necessarily make tort reform the right solution to the problem.
What many proponents of tort reform fail to mention is that tort reform lowers the level of punishment for negligence or intended injurious acts. In the business world, everything is measured in dollars and cents. If there are fewer legal ramifications for manufacturing an unsafe product, then corporations would worry less about the safety of products entering the marketplace.
Corporate wrongdoing is rampant in our society. Tort law is one of the few real incentives big corporations have to produce products that are safe – if a company knows that a product it manufacturers is deadly, and that a certain percent of people that use the product will be injured and could potentially sue for millions of dollars each, they are motivated to protect themselves and therefore the consumer.
If this incentive was severely limited by tort reform, what would stop companies from going back to putting products as bad or worse than benzene, asbestos, or pharmaceuticals with deadly side effects back in production? Studies related to non-motor vehicle accidental death rates have indicated that tort reforms do, in fact, work to increase death rates.
From a medical standpoint, tort reform is often brought in the form of a statute of limitations. For example, current laws are in place that require an individual to file a claim for malpractice within two years from the date of injury. However, many individuals do not learn of the malpractice until months or years later, when the first symptoms of the unnecessary health ailment arise. By this time, tort reform limitations have made it impossible to seek legal recourse.
In the case of mesothelioma, symptoms may not manifest for decades. In order to ensure that injured parties have a fair chance at receiving compensation, many experts on the subject, including our mesothelioma attorneys, feel that tort reform should be limited as much as possible.
Look for more information about tort reform in our next post in the series.
Tags: asbestos, mesothelioma, tort reform
