Settlements are often considered to be welfare-enhancing because they save time and litigation costs. In the presence of court error, however, this conclusion may be wrong. Court decisions create positive externalities for future litigants which will not occur if a dispute is settled out of...

We analyze the pricing of pain and suffering and, in particular, whether the corresponding compensations are affected by a court's approach to value such damages. For this purpose, we use data on pain and suffering verdicts in Austria, where courts are generally free to choose between a per diem...

There have long been claims that compensations for noneconomic damages are random because tort law does not provide clear guidance regarding these compensations. I investigate, in both settled and tried medical malpractice cases, whether noneconomic damage payments are arbitrary and what...

This article assesses predictors of payouts and non-economic damages in medical malpractice cases decided by the Spanish Supreme Court from 2006 until 2010. Medical malpractice cases can be judged in administrative or civil courts, and this distinction heavily relies on the type of hospital...

This paper assesses the widely held belief that damages for pain and suffering are random or arbitrary. We empirically analyze the differential impact of a plaintiff's personal characteristics, pain-specific circumstances and a lawsuit's procedural features on such payments. Relying on a dataset...

This paper provides a framework to evaluate human life based on civil court decisions on damages for pain and suffering. Using judgements from Germany and Austria over the last 25 years, we calculate an average Value of Damages for Pain and Suffering (VDPS) of about EUR 1.79 millions, with a...

In this paper, we examine the influence of medical malpractice tort reform on the level of private health insurance company losses incurred. We employ a natural experiment framework centered on a series of tort reform measures enacted in Texas in 2003 that drastically altered the medical...

We study the factors that predict medical malpractice ("med mal") insurance premia, using national data from Medical Liability Monitor over 1990 to 2017. A number of core findings are not easily explained by standard economic theory. First, we estimate long run elasticities of premia to...