Personal Injury Compensation: A Quick Guide
Economic and Non-Economic Damages for Personal Injury Cases
If another person or business is responsible for causing you to suffer injuries and related harms, you are entitled to received money compensation. The term for these harms is known as “damages”.
Personal injury damages fall into two main categories: economic damages and non-economic damages.
Personal Injury Economic Damages
Economic damages are monetary losses that have specific dollar amounts associated with them, such as medical expenses, lost earnings, and property damage.
Personal Injury Non-Economic Damages
On the other hand, non-economic damages relate to suffering that isn’t monetary in nature. These damages relate to what I consider the “human element” of the case, such as pain, suffering, the loss of the enjoyment of life, or mental anguish caused by the death of a family member.
How businesses treat personal injury cases
Businesses and their insurance companies usually value personal injury cases based solely on economic harms. Often, their “bottom line” mentality motivates them to only consider losses that have verifiable and specific dollar amounts, and they are reluctant to include the non-financial aspects of a case in their initial evaluations.
To maximize a client’s financial recovery, it is the job of a competent personal injury attorney to make sure a client’s non-economic (human) suffering is fairly represented and included in the negotiations and eventual resolution of a case.
For example, a shooting victim killed at a place of business won’t incur substantial medical expenses. However, his survivors should be compensated for their non-economic losses, including the mental anguish for the loss of a loved one. Likewise, a blue-collar worker or someone unemployed at the time of suffering an injury may not have a substantial amount of lost wages.
Nonetheless, he should be compensated for the inconvenience and emotional distress of not being able to care for himself. The wrongful death claim of a wife should rightfully include, at its core, the loss of the comfort, society, and attentions of her deceased husband.
The following are some of the common types of economic and non-economic damages:
ECONOMIC DAMAGES
- Medical expenses in the past and future
- Lost earnings in the past and future
- Property damage
NON-ECONOMIC DAMAGES
- Injury
- Pain and suffering
- Mental Anguish
- Emotional Distress
- Inconvenience
- Loss of sexual relations with your spouse
- Loss of the enjoyment of life
- Loss of parental guidance
- Loss of companionship
- Loss of a spouse’s comfort, society, and attentions
Contact our personal injury professional today
Andre Crenshaw, Esq. is a personal injury and wrongful death attorney with more than 20 years of experience handling personal injury and wrongful death cases. To schedule a free consultation with your Miramar Personal Injury Lawyer, call us at (954) 430-3030; email us at info@crenshawlawfirm.com, or complete and submit our online contact form to see how we may be able to help you obtain full compensation for your injuries.
