Greedy Trial Lawyer
The "Tort Tax" Ploy - Dishonesty In Tort Reform
Category: News Defused
Get ready to hear about the Tort Tax in the media. I will give you fair warning about its absurdity and purpose below. And, I will alert you to the Roadside Bombs that kill and maim our fellow Americans everyday right here in the homeland.
The latest catch phrase being repeated by big business to justify ever more tort reform (read that as less compensation for the wrongfully injured) is the supposed Tort Tax imposed upon our society by personal injury lawsuits. The Tort Tax is usually calculated to be a very large number arrived at by adding together verdicts, reserves set by insurance companies for losses in the future, litigation expenses and other related costs of the civil justice system. Then, this macro-number is divided by the population of the U.S. to come up with a cost per person. The argument is made that much of this cost is passed on to each of us by businesses and corporations as an increase in the price of goods and services.
After reading this scholarly analysis of the Tort Tax the public is expected to react viscerally and immediately recognize the need to repeal this tax. After all, who wants to be taxed in the first place? Taxes are the enemy of hardworking folks.
It should not take a Greedy Trial Lawyer to see the cute trick and absurdity that the Tort Tax really is. But, before stripping the Tort Tax of its pretences, I would direct your attention to the Roadside Bombs that corporations and businesses detonate daily all over our country, creating misery in thousands of households.
In 2004, according to federal government statistics, there were 42,636 fatalities in motor vehicle crashes. Many of them were the result of business and corporate operations. Hundreds of thousands more sustained significant wounds as a result of this business and corporate onslaught. Imagine the individual agony of each victim or family after one of these Roadside Bombs accomplishes its evil purpose. You or someone you love could be the next victim. Hold that thought while we go back to the Tort Tax.
Is it productive to any discussion of Tort Reform to use the concept of a Tort Tax? I say it is just about as productive as using the idea of Roadside Bombs in discussing the injuries and deaths on our highways.
Why is the Tort Tax a cheap trick intended to immediately prejudice everyone against the rights of the wrongfully injured?
First, let's look at its parentage. The company that yearly calculates what it calls Tort Costs does not use the phrase Tort Tax in its analysis of the data it collects. (Probably because it would be nonsensical and inflammatory to do so.)
Second, let's think about the supposed Tort Tax with our basic reasoning abilities - nothing fancy required here.
1) To the extent that the civil justice system does actually compensate wrongfully injured persons this portion of the Tort Tax is simply and definitely a cost of doing business if a business is going to wrongfully injure people. Nobody refers to the cost of office supplies as the Office Tax. Nobody should refer to the compensation paid to victims of wrongdoing as a Tax. To do so is outrageous, immoral and intentionally misleading.
2) A sizable portion of the supposed Tort Tax is the expense of litigation, most specifically, the costs spent in defending against claims. Since the vast majority of claims result in compensation being paid to victims it can be said that businesses defend too much and, therefore, foolishly choose to waste their resources instead of promptly resolving more claims before litigation expenses are incurred. Many instances can be found where more money is spent in defense of a valid claim than is actually paid in a late settlement.
3) We have a civil justice system because we, as a nation, believe in civil justice. We do not view the criminal justice system as an optional feature of life in the U.S. We are not going to dismantle either system as a result of calculations of the costs per capita. Such a calculation has no relevance to any responsible discussion of improvements or refinements in either system. I am sure all of us would gasp at the per capita cost of the criminal justice system, our national defense system and other significant and important systems in our society. After the gasping what will we have accomplished? The issues we would face in reviewing each would not be illuminated by the light of a per capita figure.
If someone truly wants to discuss improvements in our civil justice system he would not use the Tort Tax as the opening line in the conversation. He might start by actually recognizing that there are thousands of innocent people being injured in our 21st Century economy and they should have basically the same rights as they did in the last century. The starting point should not be the dishonest ploy of a Tort Tax. If it is to be the starting point, my response will be the Roadside Bombs.
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