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You've been in an accident, you've been seriously injured
you have permanent injuries. How does your attorney prove those
economic losses at trial? The subject of today's video is
about the use of an economist. I'm Dave Glatthorn. I'm an
attorney in West Palm Beach. I exclusively represent injured
people. In many cases we need to bring an economist in because
what the economist does is he will take the raw data: the loss
of wages, the fact that someone used to be able to earn $15 an
hour now they can only earn $5 dollars an hour, the fact that
they are going to need continuous medical care for the
rest of their life. And, what he does he crunches those numbers
down to come to a figure that if you give the injured person this
sum at the end of the trial - because remember the injured
person only has one day in court - if you give the injured person
this sum at the end of the trial that they will compensate them
for these economics losses. Not the human losses, but the
economic losses. This is a chart from a case that we did a little
while ago, and it breaks down and shows you what the economist
does. He has two periods here: the period up to the trial and
then the period after the trial -the future loss and the past
loss. And you can see here that past value of replacement labor
was $28,000. The past value of lost services, because he can no
longer do the work around the house that he used to be able to
and his wife had to hire people to do that work, was $13,000.
Past medical expenses at that time were $96,000 dollars.
So, just in the past he had incurred
expenses, losses, economic
losses of a $137,466. Now, the economist takes out his crystal
ball and he crunches the numbers as far as what is this person
going to need in the future. And what he's done is a very
conservative calculation because he only took the individual up
to the age of 70, whereas most people live longer than that.
But just to be conservative and to be fair on all sides and
present value of the cost of labor and the future's loss,
labor in the future, $203,185. Present value of future medical
expenses, that is to compensate him for what he is going to
incur in the future $207,389. If you add up both the past and the
future you come to a total of $648,040. Now that might sound
like a lot of money, right if you just hear it in one sum.
But, it is basically scientific calculation that leads to that
number and it is the only fair way to compensate someone that
only has one day in court. Why am I telling you all this?
Because you have questions, you have concerns. Call me. We can
answer your questions, we can address your concerns. I'm Dave
Glatthorn. I thank you for watching this video.