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Estimating The Effect Of Damages Caps In Medical Malpractice Cases: Evidence From Texas, David A. Hyman, Bernard Black, Charles Silver, William M. Sage
Estimating The Effect Of Damages Caps In Medical Malpractice Cases: Evidence From Texas, David A. Hyman, Bernard Black, Charles Silver, William M. Sage
Faculty Scholarship
Using claim-level data, we estimate the effect of Texas's 2003 cap on non-economic damages on jury verdicts, post-verdict payouts, and settlements in medical malpractice cases closed during 1988–2004. For pro-plaintiff jury verdicts, the cap affects 47-percent of verdicts and reduces mean allowed non-economic damages, mean allowed verdict, and mean total payout by 73-percent, 38-percent, and 27-percent, respectively. In total, the non-econ cap reduces adjusted verdicts by $156M, but predicted payouts by only $60M. The impact on payouts is smaller because a substantial portion of the above-cap damage awards were not being paid to begin with. In cases settled without trial, …
Federalization Snowballs: The Need For National Action In Medical Malpractice Reform, Abigail Moncrieff
Federalization Snowballs: The Need For National Action In Medical Malpractice Reform, Abigail Moncrieff
Faculty Scholarship
Because tort law generally and healthcare regulation specifically are traditional state functions and because medical, legal, and insurance practices are highly localized, legal scholars have long believed that medical malpractice falls within the states' exclusive jurisdiction and sovereignty. Indeed, this view is so widely held that modern legal scholarship takes it for granted. Articles on general federalism issues use medical malpractice as an easy example of a policy in which federal intervention lacks functional justification, and articles that focus on federalization of other tort reforms use medical malpractice as an easy foil, pointing out that the uniformity interest that justifies …