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It would seem obvious to never make up something that can otherwise be easily falsified by someone whose job it is to do that.
I am also curious why wouldn't such a frivolous case be dismissed with prejudice? And people complain about inflation, high prices, too many warnings or 'safetyism'. I wonder why.
Frivolous doesn't mean "low damages." It means that there is no legal basis for liability. Moreover we don't know how much the plaintiff's damages were. So, we can't even say that they were minimal. And, of course, oftentimes cases deemed frivolous by public opinion turn out not to be.
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Is this frivolous?
If my knee is hurt badly enough that I need to seek medical attention, take time off work, etc. it wouldn't really seem that frivolous at all to me, and I would seek compensation if I received that injury from another party.
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I think part of it is that a good portion of this is a back door way of regulating things. It would be almost impossible to pass some of these rulings legislatively. No government is going to waste time regulating the temperature of coffee. But the fear of lawsuits can have the same effect without all that nasty legislation that your opponent can use against your tribe. Most anti discrimination stuff is actually like this. It’s illegal to refuse to hire on the basis of certain characteristics. The law as written is unenforceable (hence the police don’t randomly inspect for diversity). But, if you’re [minority] and you think you’re being discriminated against, you can sue them (free to you, and expensive enough to them that they’ll often settle) giving those who sue for damages a payday. Mostly it’s a way to enforce laws that would Be impossible to enforce or legislate by giving citizens a payday for suing.
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I think you're correct that this is a large part of it, the patient doesn't want to (and often can't afford to) get stuck with the bill and the Hospitals and Insurance companies have the both the resources and the volume to keep lawyers on staff to ensure that they don't get stuck with the bill
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In the US, each side pays their own legal bills. Pretty much every other developed country defaults to the loser paying.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/English_rule_(attorney%27s_fees)
That says that the English rule is followed in Alaska. Is Alaska less litigious than the rest of the US?
I'm not sure how to measure/check that. I briefly googled but mostly got sources that only included a few states or didn't seem to be based on solid data.
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We have plenty of crazy high $$ figure lawsuits on non-medical topics also - e.g. Tesla not being aggressive enough in firing people who might have said "nigger" but they aren't really sure.
https://www.richardhanania.com/p/wokeness-as-saddam-statues-the-case
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