"Stella Liebeck, of Albuquerque, sued McDonald's in 1992 after spilling a cup of the restaurant's coffee, which burned her lap severely and hospitalized her for a week. Two years later a jury awarded her $160,000 in direct damages and $2.7 million in punitive damages, which a court later reduced to $480,000. Both sides appealed and ended up settling out of court for an undisclosed amount. Her actual hospital bill was $11,000."
I feel that lawsuits in the US are totally out of control. People sue and get sued for everything under the sun. what happened to personal responsibility? Coffee is hot, to make it even more obvious, they write it on the plastic cups. if you accidentally burn yourself, it was an accident, deal with it. If I cut myself cutting vegetables, I am not going to sue the company that made the knife. I did it, it was an accident but I caused it and I should take personal responsibility.
I am not against lawsuits in general. I just feel that the settlement should fit the crime. I have a family member who went on a vacation with a friend and her husband. While on vacation, the husband fell into a hole in the ground and broke his neck. The hole was covered with a dark plastic which made it impossible to see. There were no warning signs at all and no way for him to avoid it. He is now paralyzed for life, his wife had to quit her job to take care of him full time. Should he get millions of dollars from the construction company, sure. Why, because he will have millions of dollars in medical bills. If he had fallen in and broke a leg, should he have gotten millions of dollars, absolutely not.
Allowing people to make frivolous lawsuits and rewarding them for it has negative repercussions. It creates a greedy society and sends the message that you don't have to work for your money if you can find someone to sue. In March 2005 Ann Ayala filed a claim against Wendy's franchise owner, asserting that she had found a fingertip in a bowl of chili. It turned out to be untrue, but that is the result of a flawed judicial system. I think that someone should step in and make a law that prohibits these types of law suits. If there was a specific system in place to deal with all lawsuits, we would not have this problem.
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I agree, People in the United States are out to win the lottery.
ReplyDeletei agree with the lawsuit problem we have in the U.S. Everyone is after the money, as soon as they have an accident, they are trying to see if they can get some money from it. a few years ago a man sued mcdonalds for a million dollars, and his argument was that he has been addicted to macdonalds for the past few years, and he has put on a lot of weight. the interesting fact is that his case won, and he was awarded something like 1 million dollars. now to me this is insane, a person can decide themselves if they want to get macdonalds every day. so i totally agree that everyone in the U.S. are trying to sue others to get some money, and it is the easiest way to earn big money.
ReplyDeleteThere is a huge problem with the judical system as a whole. But, I do agree that medical law suits are out of control. People explot this and, the lawyers are way to eager to help earn a lot of cash for themselve, and their clients. Most of these attorneys do not get paid unless their cliet wins the case. This makes it is so easy for people to file law suits. Attorneys know that most hospitals, doctors, and insurance companies will settle out of court to avoid all the cost associated with a long court case. I believe two things need to happen with these types of cases. One, is that it should cost the client money up front and out of their pockets if they lose these cases, and cost them a lot to file. Maybe that will deture the get rich quick clients. Secondly, there needs to be some kind of medical lawsuit cap. By doing this will eliminate the cases that are not legit. This will also keep health care cost down.
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