{"id":5263,"date":"2006-04-12T12:43:19","date_gmt":"2006-04-12T16:43:19","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/blogs.law.harvard.edu\/formerlyknownas\/2006\/04\/12\/contingent-serendipity-no-con"},"modified":"2011-08-05T14:54:00","modified_gmt":"2011-08-05T18:54:00","slug":"contingent-serendipity-no-conspiracy","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/archive.blogs.harvard.edu\/ethicalesq\/2006\/04\/12\/contingent-serendipity-no-conspiracy\/","title":{"rendered":"contingent serendipity (no conspiracy)"},"content":{"rendered":"

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Walter Olson<\/FONT><\/A> is absolutely correct [this time]: there appears to be a <\/FONT><\/DIV>
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Contingency-fee-o-rama<\/EM><\/FONT><\/A> going on.  In addition to his kind pointer to <\/FONT><\/DIV>
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our series<\/FONT><\/A> last week, Walter notes that “Anyone interested in the <\/FONT><\/DIV>
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ethical, practical and philosophical case for and against the lawyers’ <\/FONT><\/DIV>
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contingency fee (or contingent fee; usage varies) should be sure to <\/FONT><\/DIV>
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check out” the new Featured Discussion at Point of Law<\/EM><\/A> (since April 10),<\/FONT><\/FONT><\/FONT><\/DIV>
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which “pits George Mason lawprof <\/FONT>Alex Tabarrok<\/FONT><\/A>, who’s generally sup-<\/FONT><\/DIV>
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portive of contingency fees, against <\/FONT>Jim Copland<\/FONT><\/A> of the Manhattan Institute, <\/FONT><\/DIV>
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who’s critical.”<\/FONT><\/DIV>
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\"WOlson\" For Walter’s own views, see Chapter Two<\/A> of his 1991 <\/FONT><\/DIV>
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book <\/FONT>The Litigation Explosion<\/EM>, pdf-posted at Point of Law.<\/EM><\/FONT><\/DIV><\/BLOCKQUOTE>
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Tabarrok and Copland agree that there are<\/EM> legitimate (and helpful) uses for<\/FONT><\/DIV>
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contingency fee arrangements.  They differ on what consititutes an abuse <\/FONT><\/DIV>
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of contingency fee and what (if anything) to do about it. We’ve criticized a <\/FONT><\/DIV>
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well-known study co-authored by Tabarrok here<\/A>, for elevating the results <\/FONT><\/DIV>
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that <\/FONT>he posits from economic theory <\/FONT>over the reality that is before our eyes <\/FONT><\/DIV>
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on <\/FONT>how lawyers and clients act.  Copland seems to do a bit of that, too. <\/FONT><\/DIV>
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<\/FONT> <\/DIV>
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Nonetheless, I tend to agree with Jim’s statement<\/A>:  <\/FONT><\/DIV>
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<\/FONT> <\/DIV>
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                                                                                      \"greater  \"one   <\/FONT><\/DIV>
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“Lester [Brickman]’s study, importantly, looks at the top quartile <\/FONT><\/DIV>
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of contingency fee lawyers. Some of those lawyers are indeed <\/FONT><\/DIV>
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getting paid handsomely for risk, luck, or performance. Others <\/FONT><\/DIV>
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are exploiting the information imbalance between plaintiffs and <\/FONT><\/DIV>
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lawyers to get extra cash based on the absence of price compe-<\/FONT><\/DIV>
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tition over fees. But among the lawyers not<\/EM> in the top quartile, <\/FONT><\/DIV>
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a lot are doing worse than hourly lawyers. They’re often less <\/FONT><\/DIV>
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skilled, in courtroom work, in preparation, in case screening, or <\/FONT><\/DIV>
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even in advertising strategy. Still, they stick around chasing the <\/FONT><\/DIV>
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big payoffs, at least as long as they can. The absence of price <\/FONT><\/DIV>
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competition over contingency fees leads directly to more contin-<\/FONT><\/DIV>
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gency fee lawyers — and more lawsuits and cost to society.”<\/FONT><\/DIV><\/BLOCKQUOTE>
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<\/FONT> <\/DIV>
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\"tiny  On a related note, Moe Levine left this Comment<\/A> yesterday, in <\/FONT><\/DIV>
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response <\/FONT>to our contingency fee analysis<\/FONT>:<\/FONT><\/DIV>
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. . . saying that no firm has been willing to budge from the statutory <\/FONT><\/DIV>
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maximums . . . <\/FONT><\/DIV>
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 <\/DIV>
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Which is just as likely to be evidence that the statutory maximums <\/FONT><\/DIV>
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are too low   <\/FONT><\/DIV>
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 <\/DIV>
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Second, show me any other business that charges less than the <\/FONT><\/DIV>
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statutory maxmiums–look at cable tv, credit cards, etc. etc. <\/FONT><\/DIV><\/BLOCKQUOTE>
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I sure hope the p\/i bar has better arguments than this for charging so much <\/FONT><\/DIV>
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to each injured client (no matter how large or winnable the case may be). In <\/FONT><\/DIV>
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part, I replied<\/A> to Moe:  <\/FONT><\/DIV>
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I’m still of the opinion that lawyers have higher ethical and fiduciary duties <\/FONT><\/FONT><\/DIV>
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to clients to avoid charging excessive or un<\/FONT><\/FONT>reasonable fees than do cable <\/FONT><\/FONT><\/DIV>
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tv companies or “any other business” <\/FONT><\/FONT>to their customers.  <\/FONT><\/FONT><\/FONT><\/DIV>
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<\/FONT> <\/DIV>
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\"blossomBrach\"<\/FONT><\/DIV>
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<\/FONT> <\/DIV>
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taking up<\/EM><\/FONT><\/FONT><\/DIV>
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the holy man’s chant. . .<\/EM><\/FONT><\/FONT><\/DIV>
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croaking frogs<\/EM><\/FONT><\/FONT><\/DIV>
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<\/EM> <\/DIV>
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<\/EM> <\/DIV><\/DIV><\/BLOCKQUOTE><\/BLOCKQUOTE>
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the first snowfall
doesn’t hide it…
dog poop<\/DIV>
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 <\/DIV>
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 <\/DIV>
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 <\/DIV><\/BLOCKQUOTE>
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the katydid–
even while they sell him
singing<\/DIV>
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 <\/DIV>
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 <\/DIV>
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 <\/DIV>
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 <\/DIV>
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 <\/DIV><\/BLOCKQUOTE><\/BLOCKQUOTE>
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the world today!
even while blossom viewing
a little thief<\/DIV>
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<\/EM> <\/DIV>
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    Issa<\/FONT><\/A>, translated by <\/FONT>David G. Lanoue<\/FONT><\/A><\/FONT><\/DIV>
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<\/EM> <\/DIV>
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<\/EM> <\/DIV><\/FONT><\/BLOCKQUOTE>
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                                                                                                     \"one<\/FONT><\/DIV>
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 <\/DIV><\/BLOCKQUOTE><\/BLOCKQUOTE><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Walter Olson is absolutely correct [this time]: there appears to be a Contingency-fee-o-rama going on.  In addition to his kind pointer to our series last week, Walter notes that “Anyone interested in the ethical, practical and philosophical case for and against the lawyers’ contingency fee (or contingent fee; usage varies) should be sure to check […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":94,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_jetpack_newsletter_access":"","_jetpack_dont_email_post_to_subs":false,"_jetpack_newsletter_tier_id":0,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paywalled_content":false,"_jetpack_feature_clip_id":0,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paid_content":false,"footnotes":"","jetpack_publicize_message":"","jetpack_publicize_feature_enabled":true,"jetpack_social_post_already_shared":false,"jetpack_social_options":{"image_generator_settings":{"template":"highway","default_image_id":0,"font":"","enabled":false},"version":2},"jetpack_post_was_ever_published":false},"categories":[2926],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-5263","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-pre-06-2006"],"jetpack_publicize_connections":[],"jetpack_featured_media_url":"","jetpack_sharing_enabled":true,"jetpack_shortlink":"https:\/\/wp.me\/p6kP1R-1mT","_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/archive.blogs.harvard.edu\/ethicalesq\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/5263","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/archive.blogs.harvard.edu\/ethicalesq\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/archive.blogs.harvard.edu\/ethicalesq\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/archive.blogs.harvard.edu\/ethicalesq\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/94"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/archive.blogs.harvard.edu\/ethicalesq\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=5263"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/archive.blogs.harvard.edu\/ethicalesq\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/5263\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":12691,"href":"https:\/\/archive.blogs.harvard.edu\/ethicalesq\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/5263\/revisions\/12691"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/archive.blogs.harvard.edu\/ethicalesq\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=5263"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/archive.blogs.harvard.edu\/ethicalesq\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=5263"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/archive.blogs.harvard.edu\/ethicalesq\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=5263"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}