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I wonder what would happen if parties to a civil suit were required to split their expenses with their opponent. That is, for every dollar you spend you pay a d
by stormbrew 13y ago
I wonder what would happen if parties to a civil suit were required to split their expenses with their opponent. That is, for every dollar you spend you pay a dollar of your opponent's legal expenses (and vice versa).
It would discourage using an army of lawyers against a small opponent (because it would allow them to hire an army as well), and might also help keep legal costs down in general.
I'm sure it's something that'd be a hard sell, and lawyers would probably hate it, but it's an interesting thought experiment.
- deleted 13y ago[deleted]
- jessaustin 13y agoThis could work even if the split wasn't dollar for dollar. If the deep-pocket party had to give its opponent $1 for every $3 it spends, it would still prevent 10-to-1 spending on trials. I don't think there would be anything "unconstitutional" about this, as it's just a detail about how courts should function.
- Peaker 13y agoWhy not 1-to-1? Courts are supposed to be about fairness, and leveling the playing field helps fairness.
- jessaustin 13y agoWell, most of the current system is zero to one, so at least this is more "fair" than that. In general, however, changes to the foundations of society should only be as radical as they have to be. So if we start out at $1 for $3, and that seems to work well, the ratio can be changed later as we learn more about how the new system works. If a reform is so big that it entails many "unintended" consequences (and all reforms entail some of these), the risk is great that the reform will be reversed completely.