International Comparisons of Litigation Costs: Europe, the United States and Canada
The Chamber’s Institute for Legal Reform recently released International Comparisons of Litigation Costs: Europe, the United States and Canada. From the description:
The purpose of this study is to compare liability costs – a phrase used here to describe the costs of claims, whether resolved through litigation or other claims resolution processes – as a fraction of GDP across Europe, the U.S. and Canada. General liability insurance sold to companies provides a basis for comparison because it covers similar types of liability costs in each country….
Key findings are as follows:
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The U.S. has the highest liability costs as a percentage of GDP of the countries surveyed,with liability costs at 2.6 times the average level of the Eurozone economies (see Figure 1).
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U.S. liability costs are four times higher than those of the least costly European countries inour study – Belgium, the Netherlands and Portugal.
- Although the U.S. has by far the most costly liability system, our analysis shows that liabilitycosts in the U.K., Germany and Denmark have risen between 13% and 25% per year since2008.
– SBS