If you suffered injuries due to the carelessness and negligence of someone else, you may be entitled to compensation for those injuries. This may be accomplished by having your lawyer contact the negligent party (and likely his or her insurance company) to negotiate a settlement.  However, you may have to bring a personal injury lawsuit in order to receive the compensation you truly deserve.

Different types of compensation that you may recover?

In a personal injury lawsuit, there are different types of compensation that you may recover: economic monetary damages such as payment of medical expenses, lost wages, property damage, loss of earning capacity, etc., and non-economic monetary damages such as those for pain and suffering, loss of enjoyment of life, loss of companionship, etc.

While financial recoveries for medical expenses and related out-of-pocket expenses are calculated by adding the actual amounts incurred, other types of damages require additional analysis.

Lost Wages

When you bring a personal injury lawsuit against a defendant, your lost wages may be calculated by adding up the actual time you missed work while recovering from your sustained injuries. However, lost wages may not always be so straightforward to calculate. If you must miss work in order to attend medical appointments, physical therapy, etc., you are entitled to recover those lost wages as well. Even if your employer paid you by using your vacation time, personal time, and/or sick time, you may be entitled to a recovery of that lost time. The theory behind this recovery is that had the defendant not been negligent, you would not have sustained injuries, and you would not have used your paid time off.

Lost wages incurred by self-employed individuals are often more difficult to calculate. For example, these individuals may lose more than just hours of work. Lost business opportunities, the need to hire additional help, etc. all result in lost income. In personal injury lawsuits, these types of lost income are evinced by presenting the court with both pre- and post- accident tax records, income statements, and expense reports

Loss of earning capacity

In a personal injury situation, if a working individual in any type of profession (e.g., doctor, lawyer, factory worker, skilled laborer, manager, etc.) can never resume work in the same field earning the same amount of money, he or she has suffered a partial or total loss of earning capacity. Specifically, an individual may have to take a job with lower pay in order to accommodate his or her physical limitations. In more severe cases, the person may never be able to work again. In both situations, an injured plaintiff will not reach his or her full potential in likely future employment opportunities; and that individual thereby suffers a loss in future income.

*Note: This is also true for a child or young adult who will never have the opportunity to earn an income due to injuries sustained as a result of someone’s negligence.

As you might expect, the loss of an injured plaintiff’s earning capacity is sometimes quite difficult to calculate. This has to do with the fact that a loss of such an earning capacity is calculated and estimated by incorporating a projection of likely future earnings – which necessarily requires some speculation. Factors such as inflation, probable career path, lost bonuses, lost promotion opportunities, loss of retirement benefits, health insurance, and stock options, etc., must all be taken into consideration.

Dueling experts

A personal injury lawsuit claiming a loss of earning capacity will involve dueling economic and vocational experts. The defendant’s expert will argue that the plaintiff’s expert opinion is purely speculative and that the calculation is extremely inflated. Conversely, the plaintiff’s expert will argue that the defendant’s expert report is much too conservative and fails to take into account a number of relevant factors.

Attorney Charles Teale, however, is a highly skilled, reputable, and experienced personal injury attorney who routinely hires economists and vocational experts to help determine an accurate estimation of loss of earning capacity, as well as present the evidence necessary to support this estimation.

Attorney Teale and his legal team work on a contingent-fee arrangement in personal injury cases. Therefore, you do not pay any attorneys fees or a retainer amount to Teale Law. Our firm will pay all costs associated with pursuing your claim, including costs for experts, investigations, and litigation. We recover our fees only when we successfully recover compensation for your damages.  Simply, Teale Law will only recoup expenses paid when you collect money for your case.

Contact Teale Law today at 603-230-6475 or fill out our online contact form to schedule your free personal injury consultation.