166,365 research outputs found
The tort/contract boundary: great divide or grand illusion
No full textThis thesis considers the difference between contract and the tort of negligence. It compares the traditional view of the distinction with a more contemporary view, and concludes that the two areas of law are becoming interrelated. Three main aspects of contract and tort are compared; the nature of the liability, the scope of the liability and the extent of the remedy. The historical origins of the two areas of law are explored, as are the ideological concepts which underpin them. There is also an investigation of how the courts in the UK deal with the relationship between contract and tort in both contracts for services and contracts of service; these being two areas where there is a considerable overlap between contractual and tortious liability. The thesis argues that contract and the tort of negligence are based on common historical roots and underpinned by common ideologies. In both cases, the courts seek to decide liability on the basis of 'reasonableness', a subjective concept which is determined according to their own criteria. This is seen as related to such factors as the bargaining power of the litigants, and their opportunities to secure alternative means of protection against liability. It is suggested that this is more important than whether the action is brought in contract or tort. The nature of the contract/tort divide is considered in the alternative jurisdiction of New Zealand, in order to see how it deals with the problems posed. The thesis concludes by considering whether an alternative model could be constructed in order to explain the current nature of the relationship between contract and tort, and what type of relationship should exist
Tort Reform and Accidental Deaths
No full textTheory suggests that tort reform could have either of two impacts on accidents. First, reforms could increase accidents as tortfeasors internalize less of the costs of externalities, and thus, have less incentive to reduce the risk of accidents. Second, tort reforms could decrease accidents as lower expected liability costs result in lower prices, enabling consumers to buy more risk-reducing products such as medicines, safety equipment, and medical services. We test which effect dominates by examining the effect of tort reforms on non-motor vehicle accidental death rates, using panel data techniques. We find that caps on noneconomic damages, caps on punitive damages, a higher evidence standard for punitive damages, product liability reform, and prejudgment interest reform lead to fewer accidental deaths, while reforms to the collateral source rule lead to increased deaths. Overall, the tort reforms in the states between 1981-2000 have led to an estimated 14,222 fewer accidental deaths.
Politico-economic determinants of tort reforms in medical malpractice
No full textThe U.S. tort system has experienced various reforms during the last three decades. While there is a broad literature on the consequences of these reforms, very little is known about their determinants. In this study, we investigate the politico-economic forces that were driving the reform process across U.S. states. We focus on five types of medical malpractice tort reform and apply semi-parametric proportional hazards models to assess the factors that are related to reform enactments. We find, first, that a higher fraction of Republicans in a state legislature as well as a Republican governor are the major drivers of medical malpractice tort reforms. Second, we find that a higher fraction of women in a state legislature is associated with reforms being deferred. This finding is corroborated by micro-evidence on female legislators’ voting behavior on medical malpractice tort reforms, and it is consistent with the notion that women are disproportionally aggrieved by such reforms
Losers and Losers: Some Demographics of Medical Malpractice Tort Reforms
No full textOur research examines individual differences in the effects of medical malpractice tort reforms on pre-trial settlement speed and settlement amounts by age and most likely settlement size. Findings of note include that, unlike previously assumed, both absolute and percentage losses from tort reform are small for infants in an asset value sense and that the prime-aged working population is the group most negatively affected by tort reform. Maximum entropy quantile regressions highlight the robustness of our conclusions and reveal that the settlement losses most informative for policy evaluation differ greatly from mean regression estimates.medical malpractice, tort reform, Texas closed claims, damage caps, quantile regression, maximum entropy
Punitive Damages and the Processing of Tort Claims
No full textPunitive damages are one of the most controversial aspects of tort litigation and have been the subject of various theoretical, empirical, and experimental studies. One criticism of punitive damages refers to the effect that they have on civil litigation processes. In particular, Polinsky (1997) argues that the uncertainty and unpredictability that punitive damage claims inject into a case may increase both the rate and amount of settlements, thus implying that punitive damages carry systemic consequences for the general processing of tort claims. This paper represents the first, empirical examination of this implication. With one of the largest and most comprehensive data sets of tort litigation (over 25,000 cases filed from 1994 through 1997 in several counties in Georgia), we examine the effect of the decision to seek punitive damages on several major decision points in the tort litigation process in a series of logit regression models. With extensive control variables for type of case, the presence or absence of caps on damages, and other potentially important variables, we find that seeking punitive damages has no statistically significant effect on most phases of the tort litigation process.Torts, Litigation, Punitive Damages, Settlement Rates
The Impact of Tort Reform on Employer-Sponsored Health Insurance Premiums
No full textWe evaluate the effect of tort reform on employer-sponsored health insurance premiums by exploiting state-level variation in the timing of reforms. Using a dataset of healthplans representing over 10 million Americans annually between 1998 and 2006, we find that caps on non-economic damages, collateral source reform, and joint and several liability reform reduce premiums by 1 to 2 percent each. These reductions are concentrated in PPOs rather than HMOs, suggesting that can HMOs can reduce “defensive” healthcare costs even absent tort reform. The results are the first direct evidence that tort reform reduces healthcare costs in aggregate; prior research has focused on particular medical conditions.
Liability in tort for the acts of third parties: a search for coherence
No full textThe circumstances in English tort law in which one person may be held non-vicariously liable for the acts of another have been quietly expanding in recent years, to the point where third party liability can now be said to constitute a distinct category of tortuous liability. As an obviously exceptional form of liability, it is subject to special restrictions designed to strictly limit the specific instances in which it will be recognised. Unfortunately, however, the exact substance and scope of these restrictions are far from clear, for there has been a systematic failure on the part of the courts in deciding third-party liability actions to articulate with any precision the grounds upon which their findings have been based. As a result, the law on third party tort liability has developed on an ad hoc basis and has become confused and incoherent. The specific purpose of this thesis is thus to seek out the foundational principles governing the existing categories of liability in tort for the acts of third parties, with a view to identifying a coherent basis upon which such liability can develop in the future
Tort Law and Human Rights - Second Edition
No full textThis is a completely revised and expanded second edition, building on the first edition with two principal aims: first, to elucidate the role that domestic tort principles (including the new "remedy" under the Human Rights Act 1998) play in securing to citizens the human rights standards laid down in the European Convention on Human Rights and, secondly, to evaluate tort principles for compliance with those standards. The first edition was written when the Human Rights Act 1998 was newly enacted and many questions existed as to its potential impact on tort law; answers to many of the questions which were raised at that time are only now emerging. Therefore the text has been completely updated to reflect these developments. Whether it is appropriate to attribute particular goals and functions to tort law is highly contested and the analysis begins by locating the discussion within these contemporary debates. The author goes on to examine the extent to which the action against public authorities under section 7 of the Act has impacted on the development of common law principles as well as the issue of horizontal effect of the Act between non-state actors. New chapters include: Public Authority Liability, Privacy and Autonomy Rights, Land Torts and Death
Introduction to comparative tort law: Global perspectives
No full textThe purpose of the paper is to introduce the framework for reflection and analysis about the current state of tort law and its recent developments in what has been conventionally called ‘Western’ and ‘non-Western’ tort systems
Chinese tort law between tradition and transplants
No full textThis is a short summary of the history and recent developments of Chinese tort law in the context of reception of Western legal transplants
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