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One thing that I will never understand is how insurance claims work, and how you can attach monetary value to "pain and suffering." Most claims assess damage and seek to repair/replace the damaged item. For example, say a car bumper is damaged in a fender bender. It costs $800 dollars, and the insurance company shells out that much to cover the replacement (in theory). The value of the claim is directly related to the cost of the item. Which leads me to the question, how much does pain cost? Do they figure that the discomfort is abated by giving you money and accomplishing the opposite, making you feel good? If that's the case, then why don't they compliment you, making you feel good, for an amount of time long enough to counteract the bad feelings from the pain of said accident? Or maybe chocolate, high fives, or a shot of dopamine or serotonin? Just a weird thought that I had after experiencing a claim myself.

I guess it might help if you look at money as IOU notes. Each dollar bill is an IOU worth one dollar (duh). Whenever we buy something, we owe the seller compensation in return for whatever it is we get out of the deal. In the same way, the money in the case of pain and suffering becomes a debt created by denying another human's rights. Since we use money for every other debt, it only makes sense to use it in this case as well. Sure, you could repay the debt with chocolate, serotonin shots or even cocaine, but since we use money, we usually don't.

 ghastli wrote:
One thing that I will never understand is how insurance claims work, and how you can attach monetary value to "pain and suffering." Most claims assess damage and seek to repair/replace the damaged item. For example, say a car bumper is damaged in a fender bender. It costs $800 dollars, and the insurance company shells out that much to cover the replacement (in theory). The value of the claim is directly related to the cost of the item. Which leads me to the question, how much does pain cost? Do they figure that the discomfort is abated by giving you money and accomplishing the opposite, making you feel good? If that's the case, then why don't they compliment you, making you feel good, for an amount of time long enough to counteract the bad feelings from the pain of said accident? Or maybe chocolate, high fives, or a shot of dopamine or serotonin? Just a weird thought that I had after experiencing a claim myself.

Typically, in a car wreck, they pay out to the body shop for the cost of repairs (or to you for the cost of a new vehicle, if totalled)... They will pay out for hospital/medical expenses related to that wreck, which I suppose could extend to counseling for the mental hardship?

If you can put a price tag on emotional distress, then ghastli owes me $50.

Canada has it sorted out. Anything related to physical damages can be calculated at life expectancy,and how you were negatively impacted for the duration, and whether your maximum medical improvement has been reached since the incident, yet you are not fully recovered.... Cost of care, paying for others to do maintenance, all of that can be calculated. This is where Canada differs: emotional pain and suffering is not recognized. The only thing that's covered that comes close is therapy and treatment, which is why cases in Canada involving any emotional damages get next to nothing for emotional damages. This makes sense to me..... No idea how you do it ithe states

 Ahtman wrote:
If you can put a price tag on emotional distress, then ghastli owes me $50.

Nintendo owe a lot of kids a lot of money.

That poor Cubone saw its mother killed by Team Rocket, and you had to fight the mother's ghost... That's not something a 6-7 year old expected to be doing back then.

I don't know how it works in the US, but in the UK for injuries of any nature there was usually a range that the money awarded fell into (I think legislation was introduced that set limits). The only difference being punitive damages were the Court is asked to punish an offender to send a message - like a drug company lying about the effects of a drug an covering it up.

I absolutely agree. I was involved in an auto accident a year ago...have permenant damage to my right shoulder, that will most likely follow me the rest of my life. Every morning I wake up and have to rotate my shoulder to loosen it up and alleviate the pain....yet to the insurance company....life long complications are only worth $6500. Pain cannot be quanitfied...so to reference some arbitrary insurance rulebook and pay the same claim amount to all clients is insane.

 Dreadclaw69 wrote:
I don't know how it works in the US, but in the UK for injuries of any nature there was usually a range that the money awarded fell into (I think legislation was introduced that set limits). The only difference being punitive damages were the Court is asked to punish an offender to send a message - like a drug company lying about the effects of a drug an covering it up.

"General Damages," such as emotional distress, loss of consortium, and pain and suffering, can be limited from state to state.

The real trick is, it doesn't matter if you go see a doctor, pay $7000 or more for an expert report that says you've only improved to 88% of your best condition, that you will need ongoing treatment for the rest of your life, the scum-sucking eels that work insurance companies will have their own doctors assess you, and say you are just fine.

Same thing with the army. Could get an independent psychiatric evaluation that says "this man is an immediate threat to himself and needs immediate and long-term assistance", but the insurers will make their own assessment that indicates "this man is just being an attention whore, he's fine", and then you have ex-army guys falling off the map because veterans' affairs won't help, insurance won't help, health care ain't covered, they can't afford their own treatment, and then either ex-army fellow snaps and the public is collateral, or, the ex-army fellow snaps and hangs himself or some other such thing off in some forgotten corner of the country.

 Element206 wrote:
I absolutely agree. I was involved in an auto accident a year ago...have permenant damage to my right shoulder, that will most likely follow me the rest of my life. Every morning I wake up and have to rotate my shoulder to loosen it up and alleviate the pain....yet to the insurance company....life long complications are only worth $6500. Pain cannot be quanitfied...so to reference some arbitrary insurance rulebook and pay the same claim amount to all clients is insane.

I worked as an auto claims investigator for six months out of college, and I can assure you, referencing some arbitrary insurance rulebook is not what they do.

What they do is pay you as little as possible to get you to sign the release.

Here in Australia there's a nice, neat and kind of bonkers system that has set payment for various physical injuries suffered in the workplace. It isn't for pain, suffering or even the loss of income, but compensation for the actual body part lost. The list for my home state wouldn't open for me so here's Victoria's;
http://www1.worksafe.vic.gov.au/vwa/claimsmanual/recentupdates/Execute/12.11.4%20-%20No%20disadvantage%20compensation%20table%2020090626.pdf

It's kind of funny what weird detail they go into, like you get just under $100k for the loss of sight in one eye, but if you lose the eyeball as well you get another $50k on top of that.

But then there's other places that leave you scratching your head. While you get a tick over $40k for losing your sense of smell you only get $115k for complete loss of genitals. As if loss of all sexual function is only three times worse than losing the ability to smell.


In general, well there's a pretty broadly accepted idea that if a person wrongs you in a serious manner you're entitled to compensation to cover your loss. If I my car suffered $1,000 in damage because you can't drive then you have to give me $1,000 so I am put back to where I started. But you can't 'unpain' somebody, so when paying compensation for pain we take the next best thing, a payment of cash that in theory will allow the person to buy happiness equal to the pain they suffered. As the above list shows the process is very subjective and just kind of weird, but it's better than anything else we can think of.

 Ahtman wrote:
If you can put a price tag on emotional distress, then ghastli owes me $50.

Hahaha!

 sebster wrote:


But then there's other places that leave you scratching your head. While you get a tick over $40k for losing your sense of smell you only get $115k for complete loss of genitals. As if loss of all sexual function is only three times worse than losing the ability to smell.

Usually, loss of genitals is accompanied by an added "Loss of Consortium" claim (and generally a successful claim at that!). Thus the specific damages for loss of genitals is artificially low to a degree because the general consortium claim will be for around another $50k - $150k or more.

 G. Whitenbeard wrote:
Usually, loss of genitals is accompanied by an added "Loss of Consortium" claim (and generally a successful claim at that!). Thus the specific damages for loss of genitals is artificially low to a degree because the general consortium claim will be for around another $50k - $150k or more.

Maybe in your country. Here in Australia loss of consortium has been removed in each state as it's kind of archaic.

 sebster wrote:
Here in Australia there's a nice, neat and kind of bonkers system that has set payment for various physical injuries suffered in the workplace. It isn't for pain, suffering or even the loss of income, but compensation for the actual body part lost. The list for my home state wouldn't open for me so here's Victoria's;
http://www1.worksafe.vic.gov.au/vwa/claimsmanual/recentupdates/Execute/12.11.4%20-%20No%20disadvantage%20compensation%20table%2020090626.pdf

It's kind of funny what weird detail they go into, like you get just under $100k for the loss of sight in one eye, but if you lose the eyeball as well you get another $50k on top of that.

But then there's other places that leave you scratching your head. While you get a tick over $40k for losing your sense of smell you only get $115k for complete loss of genitals. As if loss of all sexual function is only three times worse than losing the ability to smell.


In general, well there's a pretty broadly accepted idea that if a person wrongs you in a serious manner you're entitled to compensation to cover your loss. If I my car suffered $1,000 in damage because you can't drive then you have to give me $1,000 so I am put back to where I started. But you can't 'unpain' somebody, so when paying compensation for pain we take the next best thing, a payment of cash that in theory will allow the person to buy happiness equal to the pain they suffered. As the above list shows the process is very subjective and just kind of weird, but it's better than anything else we can think of.

in these cases though, isn't there usually the potential of additional suits? Like say, your employer failed to provide the safe working environment, or negligence on the part of a co worker? Way I'm reading it is you get a flat-rate compensation for x, while you are still open to pursue damages in court form the party that caused the injury.

 poda_t wrote:
in these cases though, isn't there usually the potential of additional suits? Like say, your employer failed to provide the safe working environment, or negligence on the part of a co worker? Way I'm reading it is you get a flat-rate compensation for x, while you are still open to pursue damages in court form the party that caused the injury.

Sure. This covers only the capital compensation for the loss of limbs. Lose your sense and smell and get $40k. Loss of future income and other stuff is still covered through tort.