6 ms·

I agree 100%. I've written about this here before, but I've been involved in two civil lawsuits in my life. One was in the USA, the other was in mainland Chin

I agree 100%. I've written about this here before, but I've been involved in two civil lawsuits in my life. One was in the USA, the other was in mainland China. I should stress that I am an American, and I wasn't even in China when the lawsuit over there was moving along. The Chinese process was very fast -- it went before a judge who reached a verdict in something like ten months -- and it was extremely inexpensive. Total fees were less than $10k. What's more, the court attained the right outcome, and I won the case. Still better, the court itself enforced the verdict, and I was able to attain the monetary damages it decided were owed me. The US process was interminably slow. A year on, we were barely past the starting line. Two years on, and we were just at the beginning of "discovery" -- an amazingly invasive process that appears to be unique to the US legal system. At that point bills far exceeded $150,000. I realized that I was looking at spending >$1M and taking five or ten years to fight the case, and, though I was sure I would have won in the end, decided that I had to settle and get the hell out. The US civil legal system is basically a game of financial attrition. This is why the big corporations seem to get away with whatever they want, whereas being dragged to court can be life-ruining for smaller entities and persons. I don't know how things are in Europe, and hope I never have to find out, but the Chinese civil system is truly something like 20x better than the US system. (>10x cheaper, >2-5x faster.)

johnisgood 2y ago
Pretty much what OP said, at least here in Hungary.
lurk2 2y ago
> Two years on, and we were just at the beginning of "discovery" -- an amazingly invasive process that appears to be unique to the US legal system. It’s a part of most common law legal systems.
lawn 2y ago
> I don't know how things are in Europe, and hope I never have to find out In Sweden at least this level of insanity is only heard about as anecdotes online...
- cess11 2y ago
  In civil (and criminal) law, yes, but in "förvaltningsrätt", public law, it's somewhat different. Cases are judged mainly from documents and sometimes the state can sort of force you to provide documentation in a manner similar to discovery and subpoena. It's also where you might end up with a reversed burden of proof, notably in tax cases. It's still a much saner jurisdiction in many respects, especially for physical persons. You might get marginally nicer judgements in commercial law in certain US states, though I'd personally prefer both swedish law and swedish arbitration due to a combination of lower costs and the average quality of commercial law here. The Stockholm Chamber of Commerce arbitration institute is actually rather popular among international corporations for roughly these reasons.
matips 2y ago
In Poland it is much cheaper, but it is slow or even slower.
chollida1 2y ago
> . Two years on, and we were just at the beginning of "discovery" -- an amazingly invasive process that appears to be unique to the US legal system. This is common in almost all legal systems. How else would the defendant get to examine the evidence against them and how else would you provide evidence if there was no discovery process? Its hard to imagine there would be a legal system without it.
- watwut 2y ago
  You are basing that claim on the "it is impossible to not have the same problem as US have" assumption.
- A_D_E_P_T 2y ago
  In China I recall that "the burden of proof was on the parties" and both sides were asked to submit all relevant evidence to the court. Then there were a couple of meetings where my lawyer met with the other side's lawyer to review the evidence. If you're the plaintiff and you have evidence that supports your version of events, you give it all to the court. If you're the defendant and you have exculpatory evidence, or anything that shows that the case is frivolous, you give it all to the court. The judge can then ask for more evidence, or utilize what's provided. My legal team didn't need to sift through ten years of emails in order to find a few needles hidden in the haystack. The process wasn't adversarial. The parties can't use "discovery" to get trade secrets or proprietary information. And the costs were near enough to zero. I wouldn't even say that it's a "better" system. I'd characterize US-style discovery as simply broken, and the Chinese system as something that works in a common sense way.
  - ajross 2y ago
    > If you're the plaintiff and you have evidence that supports your version of events, you give it all to the court. If you're the defendant and you have exculpatory evidence, or anything that shows that the case is frivolous, you give it all to the court. Yes, but what if you're the plaintiff/defendant and the other party has evidence in your favor? How do you get it before the court? That is what discovery is for. Honestly it just sounds like you had an easy case tried in China and a hard one tried in the US and are making some really broad assertions about the two legal systems based on a small sample size.
stevenwoo 2y ago
It's only part of the tapestry of the story, but IIRC in the New Jim Crow by Michelle Alexander, she notes that the USA stopped funding the creation of courts/judges after the 1960s as it had in prior years so now the number of cases per judge is much higher than it has ever been, this is also mentioned the season three of Serial podcast which indicts the American criminal justice system for a variety of reasons through the entire process, but both indicate the perverse incentives to avoid trial, it kind of reminded me of the persecution of innocent protagonist in The Count of Monte Cristo simply by having the justice system work the way it was supposed to with just one bad actor condemning the guy to years of injustice.
potato3732842 2y ago
I was sued in the US once. Between all the stuff it took about 3mo. You can't just spew blanket judgements when the actual course of events depends so heavily on the specific facts. I question the intelligence of anyone who managed to have a lawsuit going on for 2yr and not come away with an understanding that specific facts matter greatly.
- A_D_E_P_T 2y ago
  3 months? Small claims? Federal civil court averages 33.7 months from filing to trial. Needless to say, it can be a lot busier than that in slower districts. (~43 months in the 2nd District!) And then there are appeals, etc... Best case, we were looking at 40 months from filing to trial in the 9th District, which is statistically nominal, but the whole process would probably have taken far longer. Current statistical table: https://www.uscourts.gov/data-news/data-tables/2024/12/31/statistical-tables-federal-judiciary/t-3 https://www.uscourts.gov/data-news/data-tables/2024/12/31/st... I've never heard of a single 21st century US (Federal) civil case that went to trial in less than a year, to say nothing of three months. I can point to a mountain of cases that have been dragging for many years.
  - potato3732842 2y ago
    Now that I look at it it was 5mo, state superior court. It was not a land or probate matter or any other matter for which there is a bespoke streamlined process. Both parties agreed on records, facts, etc.

johnisgood 2y ago

Pretty much what OP said, at least here in Hungary.

lurk2 2y ago

> Two years on, and we were just at the beginning of "discovery" -- an amazingly invasive process that appears to be unique to the US legal system. It’s a part of most common law legal systems.

lawn 2y ago

> I don't know how things are in Europe, and hope I never have to find out In Sweden at least this level of insanity is only heard about as anecdotes online...

cess11 2y ago
In civil (and criminal) law, yes, but in "förvaltningsrätt", public law, it's somewhat different. Cases are judged mainly from documents and sometimes the state can sort of force you to provide documentation in a manner similar to discovery and subpoena. It's also where you might end up with a reversed burden of proof, notably in tax cases. It's still a much saner jurisdiction in many respects, especially for physical persons. You might get marginally nicer judgements in commercial law in certain US states, though I'd personally prefer both swedish law and swedish arbitration due to a combination of lower costs and the average quality of commercial law here. The Stockholm Chamber of Commerce arbitration institute is actually rather popular among international corporations for roughly these reasons.

matips 2y ago

In Poland it is much cheaper, but it is slow or even slower.

chollida1 2y ago

> . Two years on, and we were just at the beginning of "discovery" -- an amazingly invasive process that appears to be unique to the US legal system. This is common in almost all legal systems. How else would the defendant get to examine the evidence against them and how else would you provide evidence if there was no discovery process? Its hard to imagine there would be a legal system without it.

watwut 2y ago
You are basing that claim on the "it is impossible to not have the same problem as US have" assumption.
A_D_E_P_T 2y ago
In China I recall that "the burden of proof was on the parties" and both sides were asked to submit all relevant evidence to the court. Then there were a couple of meetings where my lawyer met with the other side's lawyer to review the evidence. If you're the plaintiff and you have evidence that supports your version of events, you give it all to the court. If you're the defendant and you have exculpatory evidence, or anything that shows that the case is frivolous, you give it all to the court. The judge can then ask for more evidence, or utilize what's provided. My legal team didn't need to sift through ten years of emails in order to find a few needles hidden in the haystack. The process wasn't adversarial. The parties can't use "discovery" to get trade secrets or proprietary information. And the costs were near enough to zero. I wouldn't even say that it's a "better" system. I'd characterize US-style discovery as simply broken, and the Chinese system as something that works in a common sense way.
- ajross 2y ago
  > If you're the plaintiff and you have evidence that supports your version of events, you give it all to the court. If you're the defendant and you have exculpatory evidence, or anything that shows that the case is frivolous, you give it all to the court. Yes, but what if you're the plaintiff/defendant and the other party has evidence in your favor? How do you get it before the court? That is what discovery is for. Honestly it just sounds like you had an easy case tried in China and a hard one tried in the US and are making some really broad assertions about the two legal systems based on a small sample size.

stevenwoo 2y ago

It's only part of the tapestry of the story, but IIRC in the New Jim Crow by Michelle Alexander, she notes that the USA stopped funding the creation of courts/judges after the 1960s as it had in prior years so now the number of cases per judge is much higher than it has ever been, this is also mentioned the season three of Serial podcast which indicts the American criminal justice system for a variety of reasons through the entire process, but both indicate the perverse incentives to avoid trial, it kind of reminded me of the persecution of innocent protagonist in The Count of Monte Cristo simply by having the justice system work the way it was supposed to with just one bad actor condemning the guy to years of injustice.

potato3732842 2y ago

I was sued in the US once. Between all the stuff it took about 3mo. You can't just spew blanket judgements when the actual course of events depends so heavily on the specific facts. I question the intelligence of anyone who managed to have a lawsuit going on for 2yr and not come away with an understanding that specific facts matter greatly.

A_D_E_P_T 2y ago
3 months? Small claims? Federal civil court averages 33.7 months from filing to trial. Needless to say, it can be a lot busier than that in slower districts. (~43 months in the 2nd District!) And then there are appeals, etc... Best case, we were looking at 40 months from filing to trial in the 9th District, which is statistically nominal, but the whole process would probably have taken far longer. Current statistical table: https://www.uscourts.gov/data-news/data-tables/2024/12/31/statistical-tables-federal-judiciary/t-3 https://www.uscourts.gov/data-news/data-tables/2024/12/31/st... I've never heard of a single 21st century US (Federal) civil case that went to trial in less than a year, to say nothing of three months. I can point to a mountain of cases that have been dragging for many years.
- potato3732842 2y ago
  Now that I look at it it was 5mo, state superior court. It was not a land or probate matter or any other matter for which there is a bespoke streamlined process. Both parties agreed on records, facts, etc.