The Crisis In The Tort Law Liability Insurance System

Author : Robert E. Litan
Publisher : Brookings Institution Press
ISBN 13 : 0815718446
Total Pages : 261 pages
Book Rating : 4.8/5 (157 download)

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Download or read book Liability written by Robert E. Litan and published by Brookings Institution Press. This book was released on 2010-12-01 with total page 261 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: The United States has recently witnessed an explosion of personal injury lawsuits involving medical malpractice, unsafe products, and widespread environmental hazards. Jury awards and out-of-court settlements have escalated in many cases to hundreds of thousands of dollars. At the same time, premiums for liability insurance have skyrocketed. As a result, physicians have cut back services and some municipalities and businesses have been denied liability coverage altogether. Some experts claim that only fundamental reform of the nation's civil justice system will end this "insurance crisis." But critics of such wholesale judicial reform contend that the insurance industry has launced a "tort reform" campaign to cover its own past underwriting mistakes. Liability brings together economists and experts in liability law and the insurance industry to assess the merits of the conflicting positions and to formulate sound public policy. Led by Robert Litan and Clifford Winston, the contributors describe the major changes that have contributed to the insurance crunch and set forth a methodological framework for evaluating the debate over the current liability system. They conclude that increases in premiums and cutbacks in coverage have been real but selective; that the forces in the judicial system responsible for rising liability costs are not readily subject to change; and that we know too little about the cost and benefits of the current tort system to replace it with an alternative compensation program.