Research Paper on:
Jury Awards are Out of Control

Unformatted Sample Text from the Research Paper:
they have a point, there is an argument against such action. It makes insurance prohibitively expensive in some cases, particularly as it respects physicians. Much has been discussed regarding changing  the law that allows juries to award unreasonable amounts. It should be said that short of that, judges will sometimes step in and decide that the jury awards are simply  too outrageous. Yet, when this is done it to some extent undermines the power of the jury. When should judges step in? Many questions arise when it comes to this  compelling topic. Are juries really out of control? Rubin (1993) explains that "....there is no explicit market price for injury or for death. Thus, there is no obvious way in  which juries can decide the proper dollar amount for such damage payments" (p.58). This is a good point. If each jury is an individual group, and may be comprised of  various types of people, then it makes sense to suggest that awards will vary by the jury makeup. Further, because each jury is different, and there are no specific guidelines  with which to charge the jury, then the result may seem unfair. For example, in two similar cases, awards may be very different. One jury may contain accountants and business  owners who do not like money to be given away freely. Other juries may be comprised of wealthy housewives and retirees who may not consider the costs of their decision.  There are residual costs to large jury awards. An example is that some obstetricians are leaving their practices and either going into another line of work, or moving out  of state, simply due to the high cost of litigation. Their malpractice insurance premiums may be too high, or they may fear a law suit in a high priced area.