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Many places have a ‘small claims court’, which is very similar to arbitration. The issue is that class action lawsuits are very profitable for plaintiff lawyers
by nickff 5d ago
Many places have a ‘small claims court’, which is very similar to arbitration. The issue is that class action lawsuits are very profitable for plaintiff lawyers working on contingency, so those are the cases that get brought.
- pixl97 5d agoThey are very profitable when they win, what is the win rate of class action cases. Also what is the win rate of chosen class action cases versus all potential class action cases. Measurement matters here.
- nickff 5d agoThe 'tipping point' for class actions is usually the class certification, not a final judgement by the court. Class actions are absurdly expensive for defendants, largely due to the scope of discovery, and they also cause problems for public companies (for reporting and other reasons), so public companies almost always settle them after the class is certified. On the other side, these settlements often don't offer much benefit to the class, because the plaintiff counsel take a massive fee off the top, pay off the lead plaintiff, and don't have much incentive to do anything for the remainder of the class.
- pixl97 5d agoEh, class action lawsuits are more about altering the large companies behavior in bulk because the individual harm to any plaintiff is rather small and nearly impossible to justify the expense and complexity of the suit. The plaintiff themselves would not profit off of it.
- nickff 5d agoYou're describing the 'private attorney general' theory/idea, which I'd believe if class-action lawyers were taking less remunerative cases that offered more public benefit. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Private_attorney_general https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Private_attorney_general
- thewebguyd 5d agoSmall claims is great in that in most states lawyers generally aren't allowed so right out the gate you remove the wealth asymmetry issue. The downside is the dollar amount is very small. I'd like to see small claims limits expanded tbh.
- crooked-v 5d agoAdjust them to the past X0 years of inflation from whenever the limits were last set, and peg them to inflation from then out.