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Full-Text Articles in Law
Crashworthiness: The Collision Of Sellers' Responsibility For Product Safety With Comparative Fault, F. Patrick Hubbard, Evan Sobocinski
Crashworthiness: The Collision Of Sellers' Responsibility For Product Safety With Comparative Fault, F. Patrick Hubbard, Evan Sobocinski
Faculty Publications
Crashworthiness cases often involve the following issue: Should any wrongdoing by the plaintiff in causing the initial collision reduce or bar the plaintiff’s recovery for defective crashworthiness? Jurisdictions disagree on the answer to this issue. This disagreement results in large part from differing positions on two questions. First, should products liability law use duty rules to impose liability in a way that ensures efficient accident cost reduction or should it seek fairness through relatively unstructured jury allocations of liability based on fault? Second, in addressing the first issue, should for-profit corporations be viewed as: (1) “tools” to achieve human goals …
'Sophisticated Robots': Balancing Liability, Regulation, And Innovation, F. Patrick Hubbard
'Sophisticated Robots': Balancing Liability, Regulation, And Innovation, F. Patrick Hubbard
Faculty Publications
Our lives are being transformed by large mobile “sophisticated robots” with increasingly higher levels of autonomy, intelligence, and interconnectivity among themselves. For example, driverless automobiles are likely to become commercially available within a decade. Many people who suffer physical injuries from these robots will seek legal redress for their injury, and regulatory schemes are likely to impose requirements to reduce the number and severity of injuries.
This Article addresses the issue of whether the current liability and regulatory systems provide a fair, efficient method for balancing the concern for physical safety against the need to incentivize the innovation necessary to …
Proximity-Driven Liability, Bryant Walker Smith
Proximity-Driven Liability, Bryant Walker Smith
Faculty Publications
This working paper argues that commercial sellers’ growing information about, access to, and control over their products, product users, and product uses could significantly expand their point-of-sale and post-sale obligations toward people endangered by these products. The paper first describes how companies are embracing new technologies that expand their information, access, and control, with primary reference to the increasingly automated and connected motor vehicle. It next analyzes how this proximity to product, user, and use could impact product-related claims for breach of implied warranty, defect in design or information, post-sale failure to warn or update, and negligent enabling of a …
Taxing Structured Settlements, Brant J. Hellwig, Gregg D. Polsky
Taxing Structured Settlements, Brant J. Hellwig, Gregg D. Polsky
Faculty Publications
Congress has granted a tax subsidy to physically injured tort plaintiffs who enter into structured settlements. The subsidy allows these plaintiffs to exempt the investment yield imbedded within the structured settlement from federal income taxation. The apparent purpose of the subsidy is to encourage physically injured plaintiffs to invest, rather than presently consume, their litigation recoveries. Although the statutory subsidy by its terms is available only to physically injured tort plaintiffs, a growing structured settlement industry now contends that the same tax benefit of yield exemption is available to plaintiffs' lawyers and nonphysically injured tort plaintiffs under general, common-law tax …
Design Defect Ghosts, David Owen
Design Defects, David G. Owen
Special Defenses In Products Liability Law, David G. Owen
Special Defenses In Products Liability Law, David G. Owen
Faculty Publications
No abstract provided.
Proving Negligence In Products Liability Litigation, David G. Owen
Proving Negligence In Products Liability Litigation, David G. Owen
Faculty Publications
No abstract provided.
Products Liability: User Misconduct Defenses, David G. Owen
Products Liability: User Misconduct Defenses, David G. Owen
Faculty Publications
No abstract provided.
Deterrence And Desert In Tort: A Comment, David G. Owen
Deterrence And Desert In Tort: A Comment, David G. Owen
Faculty Publications
No abstract provided.
Foreward: The Use And Control Of Punitive Damages, David Owen
Foreward: The Use And Control Of Punitive Damages, David Owen
Faculty Publications
No abstract provided.
Problems In Assessing Punitive Damages Against Manufacturers Of Defective Products, David Owen
Problems In Assessing Punitive Damages Against Manufacturers Of Defective Products, David Owen
Faculty Publications
No abstract provided.
The Highly Blameworthy Manufacturer: Implications On Rules Of Liability And Defense In Products Liability Actions, David Owen
Faculty Publications
No abstract provided.
Reflections On The Theory And Administration Of Strict Tort Liability For Defective Products, John E. Montgomery, David Owen
Reflections On The Theory And Administration Of Strict Tort Liability For Defective Products, John E. Montgomery, David Owen
Faculty Publications
No abstract provided.