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The Absolute Value of Non-Economic Damages Equates to a Person's Moral Compass Setting

By Steve Lombardi

ALL LIFE HAS SOME VALUE: The Time Value of Money relates to societies moral compass setting.

Right after 9/11 I was scheduled to trek to Mt. Everest Base Camp from Katmandu. I'm in Nepal and a man says to me, "You Americans have everything and yet you have nothing." Well, you can't say something like that to me and not get my thinking. For the next two weeks I thought about what that man said, and some day I'll tell you about what it means to me but today the answer to that questions probably isn't as important as is the time-value of money. So let's get to discussing societies moral compass setting.

Before we begin I need for you to answer a simple question: Can we agree that all life has a value?

Some lives more than other lives, but all life has some value. Now don't get me wrong, I've met (a few lawyers I know) or read (Maddoff, Manson and Dahlmer to name a few) about certain people whose value I would say is negative or even zero; but, zero and below is still mathematically a value. Negative mind you, but even negative 1,000 is a number. And numbers are values. If we can value something, even human life, then we can value it in terms of monetary remuneration.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=s8yvZ7pIZns&NR=1

The State of Iowa has valued life in several different ways. Some valuation methods apply to humans and others to animals, poached animals to be specific. For instance if you drive drunk and kill someone the judge is required by law to enter judgment against the drunk driver and in favor of the estate for $150,000.00. On the other hand a jury is allowed and judge in Iowa will allow a finding that the life of an 11-year old intelligent and obedient girl in perfect health has no monetary value, not even to her parents. This is in contrast to Iowa law that sets a value of wild animal life that a poacher shoots. According the State of Iowa legislature and the judiciary ducks, geese and even a frog can have more value than human girls. You might think I'm kidding but this is fact. If you doubt it just follow the links. This is true in many states, that poached animals have more value than do Iowa's human children.

When did Iowa road kill take on more value than human life wrongfully taken?

Turtle poaching - has more value to the State of Iowa than can a child's life to their parents.

Even some inanimate objects in Iowa (vegetation, ginseng) with no semblance of human or animal life can have more legal human value than the life of an 11 year old girl. Oh not in my mind, but according to the law and politics. Ginseng harvested without a right to do so can cost you three times the market value as can the unauthorized cutting down of trees. That's the law in Iowa. I am being serious, I tried that case of Jessica and an Iowa District Court Judge, justices of the Court of Appeals and the Iowa Supreme Court allowed a jury in Iowa to find that Jessica's life had no value to either her estate or her parents. Only Justice Baker, then of the Court of Appeals of Iowa found it wrong and would have sent it back for a new trial on the issue of damages.

So what is this blog about today and why am I ruminating about Jessica. Today's headlines report that France is after 50 years agreeing to set aside for the first year $13.6 million or 10 million euros to compensate the victims of nuclear tests carried out in Algeria and the South Pacific. The nuclear testing radiated some 150,000 people. And after 50 years they are deciding to pay something; a fact that got me thinking about how governments conduct the business of governing. Do governments as a matter of policy simply wait for victims to die off? At this point there are but a few hundred survivors of those nuclear tests. The rest more than likely suffered from radiation sickness, cancer or died of natural and unnatural causes both related and unrelated to radiation exposure.

France to compensate nuclear test victims, AP and published in the Chicago Sun Times, March 24, 2009

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=p2wvPP5zWQM

I got to thinking about those victims and that in turn got me thinking about the time value of money. The time value of money is a financial concept; if you raise your financial IQ it will take you far in life. The time value of money has to do with present and future values. Holding the right to own a thousand dollars today is worth more than if you will have that right ten years from now. If you have to wait 50 years to get paid the $1,000.00, the value today is far less than $1,000.00. If I hand you $1,000.00 today, it is worth $1,000.00. But if after being paid the $1,000.00 you agree to pay someone else $1,000.00 in ten years you can put say $700.00 in the bank drawing interest and in ten years the $700.00 will grow to $1,000.00. In the meantime you have the use of the $300.00. Compound interest and interest rates, growth rates have to do with the time value of money.

Nuclear tests were carried out from 1960 until 1996. The destruction was indescribable and incalculable.

So looking back to the French Polynesians and the people of the Sahara Desert; the monetary value of the quality of their lives has been devalued after decades of waiting for compensation. The French government simply had to hold onto the money, have the use of the money, could have invested the money all the while the victims did not have the use of the money. And that's the lesson of insurance really and the time value of money. You take the insured's premium dollars, hold it, invest it and then say prove it, drag it out and all the while you get to use the money. All the while the reserves of cash you hold grow and in the end when the insurance company is forced to pay out the actual damages, they have made a nifty profit.

And, like Wall Street insurance execs can pay themselves billions of dollars in frivolous bonuses while they accuse the injured of filing frivolous lawsuits. Hey let's wave the flag and call it the American way. Where do we sign up?

An Example

If I say to you I'll give you a million dollars to use for ten years but you have to give it back at the end of the decade, would you do it? Would having the use of a million dollars for ten years have a value to you? Of course it would. Having the use of money may be as important as owning the money outright. And that's the time value of money.

For humans the value of time is about quality of life issues. If I give you just enough money to pay your bills but confine you to your home; then the quality of your life isn't really worth very much and I've devalued you as a human being. On the other hand if I give you just enough money to pay the bills, let you out of the house but you really can't afford to go anywhere because you can't afford bus fare, then again I've devalued your life. Because to you time has no value. Your days are worth nothing if you can't do anything with that time. On the other hand if you have money to pay for bus fares, baseball game tickets, gas for the car to vacation or to buy a new pair of shoes then that time has value to you. If by making your life miserable, with no money to spend to make it better I take away the quality of your life and I've devalued you as a human being. These are the noneconomic damages that tort reformers would like to eliminate from the compensatory damage equation. It's the same way communist's and socialists think and act. You have to get permission before you can enjoy life.

What is more important to society, life or property? You be the judge and jury.

So how is it done?

You do it one day at a time. Those days turn into weeks, then months and all those months melt into years and finally decades. And one day you wake up and fifty years has transpired. Most of the victims are now dead and gone on to greener pastures; the French Minister says it's time to heal old wounds, you pay out a few Euro and bingo the matter hopefully goes away. You get the interest and all the investment return and the dead get a few Euro and an apology.

So why am I ruminating about all of this?

I'm back to Jerrica and the value of her life and how her parents were treated. Shoddy really. The system and our government treated them without respect and dignity. It's insulting to be told this gem of a child they raised and all the time the spent, energy, love and yes money they invested in her upbringing is somehow valueless in the eyes of the law. Twenty-eight years I've been trying lawsuits and valuing life in dollars and cents and still I can think of no justification that will satisfy how I think and feel about a verdict that awards nothing for the value of human life. Telling juries and arguing against defense and insurance interests that my client's life has value and listening to them say a child's life is valueless. How do they sleep at night? Don't ask me because I couldn't do it. The system failed these parents and especially Jerrica.

And that's why tonight I'm up ruminating rather than sleeping. The date is getting closer and closer to Jerrica's birthday and that day never goes by without me pausing and giving thought to how unfair the civil justice system can be for some of my clients.

• Oh how the acid in my stomach churns tonight.

So if anyone asks me whether I seek justice or fairness for my clients, I tell them all the same thing. I'll take fairness over justice any day of the week. Justice doesn't have to be fair. Justice is applying facts to law, and in the Midwest at times it's done by the judges and juries in a very matter-of-fact cold hearted and mindless way. In the case of Jerrica Phelan-Ruden stone cold. The juries hearts were stone cold; and that is why tonight I'm ruminating about the time-value of human life.

Originally posted at InjuryBoard by Steve Lombardi

Full post as published by Des Moines Personal Injury Lawyer on April 09, 2009 (boomark / email).