The Case For Tort Reform Gets Harder And Harder To Make (But That Won’t Stop Some)

It is absurd to criticize a fee structure that puts a lawyer in complete concert with his client’s interests and allows clients without resources or influence to pursue remedies against the most powerful institutions in their community for real harm done to them. Back in the day, the argument was that verdicts were too numerous and high for insurance to cover. That was always just Chamber of Commerce nonsense.

The proof is that they won’t stop – even now. From the Washington Examiner.

“Physicians win 80% to 90% of the jury trials with weak evidence of medical negligence, approximately 70% of the toss-up cases, and 50% of the cases with strong evidence of medical negligence …. The fairness of settlements in medical malpractice has also been investigated. In all but one of the 12 published studies, the likelihood of a settlement payment and the size of any payment have been correlated with the strength of the evidence alleging negligence.”

The proposed solution? Of course, attack the lawyers.

Ultimately, it is scandalous that about 70% of filed litigation for medical malpractice results in no-recovery and that a nontrivial number of those cases are for actions by medical professionals that can be assessed as likely nonnegligent early in the litigation. The solution is to restructure economic incentives for the plaintiffs’ bar to deter this proliferation of litigation and no-recovery cases that is souring the reputation and credibility of the American legal system.

Real trial lawyers eat only when they kill. Since when did that become anything other than a virtue?