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Bill: Open Courts and Responsibility Act
Details
Submitted by[?]: Populist Liberal Party
Status[?]: defeated
Votes: This is an ordinary bill. It requires more yes votes than no votes. This bill will not pass any sooner than the deadline.
Voting deadline: February 2126
Description[?]:
| Whereas, Caps on damage awards on malpractice lawsuits only serve to protect bad doctors and their insurance companies, and Whereas, Limits on damages can force a person badly mistreated by a reckless physician to be disabled and rely on the government for subsistence for life, when proper treatment would allow him to live independently at a higher standard, and a proper lawsuit would allow him to be supported above subsistence, not by the government, for a disability that was someone else's fault, and Whereas, If the reckless physician's insurance company is not required to support the victim, and cannot be required to by the courts, the victim has nowhere to turn, We hereby propose removing the caps on damages from malpractice lawsuits. |
Proposals
Article 1
Proposal[?] to change Tort reform on non-civil lawsuits.
Old value:: There is a cap on monetary damages awarded to patients in lawsuits.
Current: There is no cap on monetary damages awarded to patients in lawsuits.
Proposed: There is no cap on monetary damages awarded to patients in lawsuits.
Debate
These messages have been posted to debate on this bill:
| Date | 04:03:00, October 14, 2005 CET | From |  Kanjoran People's Party | To | Debating the Open Courts and Responsibility Act |
| Message | I disagree. Juries are prone to overly extend punishment to the doctors by offering grandiose rewards to the victims. These can go to far and make The important thing is setting a sensible cap, not eliminating it altogether. Also, high monetary damages against bad doctors means high costs for insurance companies. This leads to higher insurance costs for all doctors (good and bad) and hospitals. This puts medical care out of reach for more and more people. I oppose. |
| Date | 04:21:02, October 14, 2005 CET | From | Populist Liberal Party | To | Debating the Open Courts and Responsibility Act |
| Message | It has been shown repeatedly that insurance companies do not pass any lowering of costs on to doctors, but rather pocket it. |
| Date | 04:34:28, October 14, 2005 CET | From | Kanjoran People's Party | To | Debating the Open Courts and Responsibility Act |
| Message | But I'm sure when an insurance company's expenses go up they will opt to pass the costs onto doctors. In light of that logic case, if we remove the cap on monetary damages my scenario will happen. Otherwise, we trust capitalism to provide us with a company that will offer lower rates to doctors because it is affordable and they'll steal everyone else's business. Then the other companies have to follow suit or go out of business. Thus insurance costs will lower to equilibrium prices. The wonders of modern economics. |
| Date | 04:44:03, October 14, 2005 CET | From | Populist Liberal Party | To | Debating the Open Courts and Responsibility Act |
| Message | It's been shown in real life in states that pass closed courthouse measures with liability caps, that insurance costs for doctors do not go down. Also, if a person holding a good job gets disabled by a reckless doctor, should he have to live much lower when he did nothing to deserve it? Should he have to fall back on the minimal subsistence income we provide? Should the government have to provide it? The PLP's belief is that the reckless doctor (through his insurance company) should provide enough money to support him at the same level he lived at, plus provide for any extra medical expenses the doctor's recklessness forced him to incur. |
| Date | 13:33:39, October 14, 2005 CET | From | Kanjoran People's Party | To | Debating the Open Courts and Responsibility Act |
| Message | "It's been shown in real life in states that pass closed courthouse measures with liability caps, that insurance costs for doctors do not go down." - We're not dealing with that here. You want to raise the costs for insurance companies here, not lower them. This will raise the costs for doctors exponentially. Insurance costs will rise because the insurance companies still want their money. And doctors will have no choice but bill more because they need to make a living and sustain their business. And patients as a whole will suffer from increased costs for insurance companies, doctors, and themselves. There are more patients helped by doctors than victimized by them. Let's protect them, too. |
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Voting
| Vote | Seats | ||||
| yes |
Total Seats: 119 | ||||
| no | Total Seats: 254 | ||||
| abstain |
Total Seats: 226 |
| Random fact: "OOC", "IC" and "IG" are commonly-used acronyms in Particracy. "OOC" refers to comments, discussions and actions which are out-of-character, meaning they are done player-to-player rather than party-to-party. "IC" refers to in-character interactions (ie. party-to-party). Similarly, "IG" means in-game, although this term may also simply refer to what happens in the actual game interface, as opposed to on the forum or elsewhere. "RP" just means "role-play". |
| Random quote: "I think one should not go fast, because if you make mistakes you don't realize what you've done." - Manuela Carmena |