To add to the other commenter's reply. These damages have little to do with compensating the damaged party and far more to do with punishing the infringer as a

To add to the other commenter's reply. These damages have little to do with compensating the damaged party and far more to do with punishing the infringer as a way to provide a dis-incentive for them to do something similar in the future. An example is in some average lawsuit where someone is hurt by something and unable to work.. let's say they can never work again... Now if we assume the company, or person, responsible would only have to pay for their hospital bills (200k maybe?) and their lifetime salary (50 years of working at the US avg of 50k a year) we only get to about 2.7 mil... In these cases the courts generally find that the compensatory damages aren't large enough to provide the dis-incentive necessary... Or so I understand it.