> The lady burned by the McDonalds coffee was really hurt, and was only one of many many people burned by McDonalds coffee, who refused to serve it less hot.
What the documentary left out, was that it happened over a 10 year period where 700 out of 171 BILLION customers got burned from mcdonald's coffee. This is statistically nothing.
> Tort reform is largely a concept pushed by big business trying to avoid getting sued when they do wrong.
While I do not know who created the youtube video you posted, the "Hot Coffee" documentary that is frequently mentioned about the liebeck case is actually created by a special interest group, "Association of Trial Lawyers of America". If you think this movie doesn't have an agenda as well, I have a bridge to sell you. A video that does a better job of clearing up the misconceptions of the case is here: http://www.hotcoffeetruth.com/ .
> The number of frivolous lawsuits in the US is actually pretty low.
I have a hard time believing this. Frivilous lawsuits are easy to do in america and my friends (annoyingly) do them all the time. In fact, they brag about the ease of doing it. My personal estimate is around 70% of "I was injured" lawsuits from my friends were just made up to cash out.
Finally, "hot coffee" lawsuits happen all the time in america at temperatues as hot or hotter than what was given in liebeck case. And the cases almost always get thrown out by judges and juries because they are regarded as "frivilous". Source: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Liebeck_v._McDonald%27s_Restau...
>What the documentary left out, was that it happened over a 10 year period where 700 out of 171 BILLION customers got burned from mcdonald's coffee. This is statistically nothing.
That is the problematic thinking right there. You are sacrificing 700 people to be burned so badly by coffee they require skin grafting based on it being statistically insignificant.
While no doubt many cases settled, many didn't and in those cases McDonalds was ordered to turn the temp down so spilled coffee would at least not result in scalding that require skin grafting. It is not small thing or statistically insignificant that McDonalds ignored many court orders, but why did they ignore the court order? Because the same cost benefit analysis you presented, they'd happily continue their practicies of selling 171B coffees and paying out 700 claims, than change the coffee temp and potentially lose any coffee market share.
As I mention above this well known case is unique because it awarded punitive damages, equaling 1 day of coffee sales, solely because the company repeatedly ignored court orders (i.e. Told the court to go fuck itself), further what is never mentioned consistent with the anti-litigation PR is that the judgement was appealed and ultimately lowered.
> What the documentary left out, was that it happened over a 10 year period where 700 out of 171 BILLION customers got burned from mcdonald's coffee.
1. There aren't 171 BILLION customers on the planet.
2. So I can run around throwing boiling water over 10 out of the 300 MILLION people in the US, and it's totally cool because it statistically didn't happen? Good to know!
http://www.hotcoffeetruth.com/ also has an agenda. It's paid for by the U.S. Chamber of Commerce (a business lobby group) which is criticized in Hot Coffee.
Your appeal to this website is just as bad really.
What the documentary left out, was that it happened over a 10 year period where 700 out of 171 BILLION customers got burned from mcdonald's coffee. This is statistically nothing.
> Tort reform is largely a concept pushed by big business trying to avoid getting sued when they do wrong.
While I do not know who created the youtube video you posted, the "Hot Coffee" documentary that is frequently mentioned about the liebeck case is actually created by a special interest group, "Association of Trial Lawyers of America". If you think this movie doesn't have an agenda as well, I have a bridge to sell you. A video that does a better job of clearing up the misconceptions of the case is here: http://www.hotcoffeetruth.com/ .
> The number of frivolous lawsuits in the US is actually pretty low.
I have a hard time believing this. Frivilous lawsuits are easy to do in america and my friends (annoyingly) do them all the time. In fact, they brag about the ease of doing it. My personal estimate is around 70% of "I was injured" lawsuits from my friends were just made up to cash out.
Finally, "hot coffee" lawsuits happen all the time in america at temperatues as hot or hotter than what was given in liebeck case. And the cases almost always get thrown out by judges and juries because they are regarded as "frivilous". Source: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Liebeck_v._McDonald%27s_Restau...
The liebeck case was the exception, not the rule.