THE EFFECT OF STATE TORT REFORMS ON CLAIM FILINGS

Joan T. Schmit, Mark J. Browne and Han Duck Lee

Risk Management and Insurance Review, 1997, vol. 1, issue 1, 1-17

Abstract: Abstract: Currently, the U.S. Congress continues to debate the passage of a tort reform bill. Such a bill is intended to limit legal liabilities, particularly as they relate to product accidents. While passage of a federal law in the 1990s remains difficult, many states found tort reform a successful proposition a decade earlier. The intent of this paper is to add to the discussion regarding the expected effects of tort law modifications by providing some background on the most widely enacted state tort reforms, presenting results from the literature on actual and expected effects of these reforms, and presenting new empirical evidence on the efficacy of these same reforms. The results indicate that caps on non‐economic damages and imposition of fines on frivolous litigation are negatively related to the rate of tort filings, while modification of joint and several liability demonstrates a positive relationship with the rate of tort filings, and reforms of the collateral source rule and imposition of punitive damages demonstrate no effect.

Date: 1997
References: View references in EconPapers View complete reference list from CitEc
Citations: View citations in EconPapers (3)

Downloads: (external link)
https://doi.org/10.1111/j.1540-6296.1997.tb00060.x

Related works:
This item may be available elsewhere in EconPapers: Search for items with the same title.

Export reference: BibTeX RIS (EndNote, ProCite, RefMan) HTML/Text

Persistent link: https://EconPapers.repec.org/RePEc:bla:rmgtin:v:1:y:1997:i:1:p:1-17

Access Statistics for this article

Risk Management and Insurance Review is currently edited by Mary A. Weiss

More articles in Risk Management and Insurance Review from American Risk and Insurance Association
Bibliographic data for series maintained by Wiley Content Delivery ().