I’ve long said that attorneys upset that their profession is held up to ridicule would have much less of a problem if attorneys were more concerned about the behavior that led to the ridicule than about the ridicule itself. A young attorney guest-anony-blogging on Evan Schaeffer’s blog provides a sterling example of such misdirected outrage, in this case, at a recent Institute for Legal Reform advertising campaign. Bonus sophistry: the author defines “frivolous lawsuit” to exclude the vast majority of problematic lawsuits that reformers are complaining about, and then happily concludes that there isn’t a problem with lawsuit abuse because there are already mechanisms for dealing with the narrowly circumscribed category of suits.
Bonus made-up medical-malpractice statistic unburdened by real data: “In states where the [medical] profession self-polices to a stricter degree, malpractice claims are far less frequent.” There’s no evidence that this is true; as Martin Grace noted a year ago, malpractice litigation is sufficiently random that previous claim history does little to predict future claim history. See also POL Jan. 6, 2005.
(Of course, if lawyers really believed that the problem with malpractice insurance rates was that the doctors weren’t self-policing, there is an easy solution that would end high insurance rates, make lawyers a huge profit, and end any pressure for liability reform. The only reason we don’t see the solution is because the lawyers know better than to put their money where their mouth is.)
One Comment
Like most issues, this one is a tension b/t your perception of “too many frivilous lawsuits” – and my perception that insurance companies stick it to consumers day-in-and-day-out.
Which is true? Of course, the answer is both. Even one frivilous lawsuit is too many. Even one crooked insurance company, or corporation grinding a person into the dirt is too many.
Please remember that intelligent reform is welcomed by all intelligent attorneys.
I balk at arbitrary damage caps – that punish only the most badly injured. I balk at “reform” that has no basis in fact – and that inspires no reduction in insurance rates. I balk at “reform” that is hateful and inspired to further line corporate pockets at the expense of the injured.
Call me a liberal if you must. I just have this crazy notion that human suffering has value. I think it should be avoided. I think that anyone causing human suffering it should be held fully accountable.
Thank you for the chance to vent.