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How A Lawsuit Over Hot Coffee Helped Erode the 7th Amendment

priceonomics.com

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Re: How A Lawsuit Over Hot Coffee Helped Erode the 7th Amendment

#81

Post by nemo »

crusso wrote: post #6
TazeTSchnitzel wrote: post #5

I've always (and I mean always; I've long been aware about the real story) thought the comments about the coffee lawsuit were extremely cruel. 'Oh, hot coffee fell on her lap and burned her, and she sued for millions in damages!' - hot coffee at an unreasonably high temperature fell on her lap and gave her third-degree burns . To suggest she was suing over something trivial is horribly disrespectful to a woman who su…

Sorry, I'm still someone who doesn't get it. Coffee is brewed hot (195 - 205 degrees F), and I personally like it to be freshly brewed as I drink it. As I very carefully sipped my fresh Starbucks coffee today at the mall, I was very conscious of the fact that I had a hot beverage in my hand. If I had accidentally spilled the coffee on myself or others it could have caused some serious burns... who else's fault would…

Read the actual trial history. Your analogies don't reflect what actually happened, which is why you can't understand it.

Liebeck was hospitalized for 8 days with multiple skin grafts. She asked asked McDonalds for medical expenses from the injury from the coffee and lost wages (At that point she got an attorney. They tried to settle. McDonalds refused. In the trial it came out that McDonalds had more than 700 reports of medical injuries from the coffee that they were aware of. Their internal quality control manager reported that they recognized that they were posing a burn hazard to customers with the heat of their coffee, but that it was a minor concern that they were unwilling to adjust.

McDonalds admitted that not only were they burning customers who drank the coffee straight from the cup, many of whom needed medical treatment, but that this was something they were unwilling to change.

That's why the jury hit McDonalds with punitive damages of the profits of two day's sales of coffee (which the judge reduced). Through the whole process McDonalds was acting like a criminally negligent bully unconcerned with injuring customers. Punitive damages did correct this.

Re: How A Lawsuit Over Hot Coffee Helped Erode the 7th Amendment

#82

Post by aaronem »

Karunamon wrote: post #74
aaronem wrote: post #71

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I've argued the substance of the issue elsewhere in this thread, and don't feel a need to restate points which you so evidently have no interest in considering. From a purely pragmatic stance, though, may I suggest you hang your argument for tort reform off some case other than one in which someone's genitals had to be rebuilt more or less from scratch?

That tends to happen when you dump hot things where hot things shouldn't go. The same kind of idiocy that leads to the absurd list of obvious warnings on products that we all like to make fun of. Irons warning you not to use them on clothes you're wearing. Baby strollers telling you to remove the baby before collapsing it. Coffee cups telling you the contents may, indeed, be hot. Is the severity of the self-inflicted…

> What cements the case as being meaningless in my mind is the fact that they were not ordered to strengthen their cups or to brew at a lower temperature.

And if such sanctions had been within the ambit of the jury empaneled, in a civil case, to consider the damages specifically due Stella Liebeck as remedy for her injuries, this statement might actually mean something.

You know, you've got this hilarious sort of completely unintentional doublethink going on that I just can't get enough of. I mean, on the one hand, you're tossing off all the slippery-slope-to-the-nanny-state clichés which are so depressingly common in arguments over this very case -- and on the other hand, you're blithely implying that the very same jury, which you hold in such thinly veiled contempt for having found differently from how you believe you would have in their position, should have had the power not merely to award monetary damages to Ms. Liebeck as they did, but should also have had nigh-untrammeled power to regulate the operations of a world-spanning corporation in whatever fashion they saw fit.

There's a certain essential irreconcilability in these opinions which I think you haven't yet noticed. Did the jury have too much power, or too little? Is the state too nanny, or not nanny enough? It can't be both. Make up your mind!

Re: How A Lawsuit Over Hot Coffee Helped Erode the 7th Amendment

#83

Post by aaronem »

andrewguenther wrote: post #76
mindslight wrote: post #54

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Different people enjoy their coffee at different temperatures. Those who enjoy drinking steam should be able to make that choice without being "protected" from themselves. I'd love it if the serving temperature of the coffee became more of a prominent option - I personally have to let freshly brewed coffee sit for ~20 minutes to be drinkable, and I even go so far as to delay adding cream (if I am going to) so that it…

Did you miss the part where the coffee was hot enough to melt skin and incur third degree burns? If you want that, then yes, I would say you need to be protected from yourself.

I wouldn't go so far as to say that such a person needs to be protected from himself. But, as with any other bizarre fetish revolving around self-harm, the proper place to indulge it is at home.

Re: How A Lawsuit Over Hot Coffee Helped Erode the 7th Amendment

#84

Post by DanBC »

stuki wrote: post #78
DanBC wrote: post #66

Earlier quoted context omitted.

People might expect coffee to be hot, but they do not expect the coffee to be hot enough to kill. She suffered full thickness burns. This is a significant wound. The burns were on her legs and genitals. That turns it into a medical emergency - rush to nearest hospital, let them stabilize you and send you to a different hospital that specializes in burns. Also, the car was not moving at the time of the accident.

Any coffee heated to the point where it is still drinkable at the end of a 20 minute commute, will be hot enough to kill if poured straight down your throat in one gulp. It is up to the customer to have some sort of clue. I am pretty sure that when granny makes coffee herself at home, she makes it at least as hot as McDonalds serves it. Whistling kettles and all. In a country of millions of people doing stuff, someti…

She didn't ask for coffee that would stay hot after a twenty minute commute. She asked for coffee.

She was served coffee hotter than other places served coffee. Other places had listened to and responded to the CDC's warning about beverage serving temperatures and had reduced the temperature of the drinks that they served while still allowing people to order extra hot drinks.

Yes, when a kettle boils the water is at 100 Celsius. But you pour that into a cup and add milk. Try it at home if you have a thermometer. Try taking the temperature of coffee that you find acceptable to drink with the temperature that McDonalds was serving their coffee at.

Do you realise that the McDonalds coffee case was used as propaganda by insurance companies? They misreported the case (they said she was driving; that the vehicle was moving; that she sued for and got millions;) they also said "of course coffee is hot"'and did not mention that McD's was serving coffee hotter than other places and had ignored many previous injuries and the CDC warning on temperature.

Re: How A Lawsuit Over Hot Coffee Helped Erode the 7th Amendment

#85

Post by avalaunch »

crusso wrote: post #22
Tuna-Fish wrote: post #16

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> Coffee is brewed hot (195 - 205 degrees F), and I personally like it to be freshly brewed as I drink it. As I very carefully sipped my fresh Starbucks coffee today at the mall, Starbucks coffee is not served anywhere near that hot. By their corporate guidance, the normal acceptable range of temperature for coffee served to customers is 145-165F. If you poured that in your lap, it would be very unlikely for you to r…

Okay, so let's say it's 165F and I spill a cup on someone. There's still going to be an injury. Scalding burns can occur at temperatures down to 125F or so. Whose fault is it? Does Starbucks have to lower the temperature of the coffee they're serving to maybe 115F in order to avoid responsibility? If I spill it in someone's eye, that may still cause an injury. Does Starbucks need to serve their hot coffee at 98.6F? I…

I think it comes down to expectations. There's an expectation when you buy a drink that it will be served at a drinkable temperature. True, there's also an expectation when you buy coffee that it will be served at a temperature hot enough to cause injuries if you spill it on yourself. But the expectation is that those injuries will be first or perhaps second degree burns, certainly not third. Had that been the case, I don't think any jury would have awarded her any money. I also don't think she would have sued.

To continue your Walmart analogy, the expectation would be that the guns are sold empty. But if instead Walmart were selling guns preloaded without warning the customers that there were bullets already in the guns, I would argue that Walmart would be at least some percentage at fault when some percentage of their customers inevitably shot themselves or others, just as it was some percentage McDonald's fault when their customers spilled the dangerously hot coffee on themselves.

Re: How A Lawsuit Over Hot Coffee Helped Erode the 7th Amendment

#86

Post by dinkumthinkum »

stuki wrote: post #68
tzs wrote: post #36

"Tort reform" can seriously screw over people, because the parties that tend to favor tort reform (by which they mean greatly limiting the ability of people to sue and/or the amount they can win if they do sue) also tend to favor limiting government regulation and oversight. That can leave nothing to compensate for the removal of the deterrence factor that the threat of lawsuits provides against bad corporate or prof…

Reputation systems, reviews and properly skeptical consumers, are what to aim for, in determining who is good and who is not. Whether for restaurants or doctors. Not frightfully pricey lawyers and other coercive, after-the-fact institutions. And, in the most egregious of cases, say McDonald's spiked granny's coffee with a hand grenade, the criminal courts get involved as a last ditch anyway. Reliance on civil courts…

Reviews are for people that don't know statistics. Mostly what you get are unhelpful bimodal distributions, hardly a way to redress serious grievances. I think your discount of civil court is either naive itself or just o early cynical to the same effect.

Re: How A Lawsuit Over Hot Coffee Helped Erode the 7th Amendment

#87

Post by SilasX »

aaronem wrote: post #17
crusso wrote: post #6

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Sorry, I'm still someone who doesn't get it. Coffee is brewed hot (195 - 205 degrees F), and I personally like it to be freshly brewed as I drink it. As I very carefully sipped my fresh Starbucks coffee today at the mall, I was very conscious of the fact that I had a hot beverage in my hand. If I had accidentally spilled the coffee on myself or others it could have caused some serious burns... who else's fault would…

Your opinion isn't unreasonable per se, but the jury which evaluated the merits of Liebeck's claims disagreed, and it's as simple as that; the opinion which matters, from a legal perspective, is that of the jury which considered and ruled on the case. It's hard to blame them, too, given the facts of the matter; even the Priceonomics article considerably understates the severity of her injuries, as is common even in t…

>Your opinion isn't unreasonable per se, but the jury which evaluated the merits of Liebeck's claims disagreed, and it's as simple as that; the opinion which matters, from a legal perspective, is that of the jury which considered and ruled on the case.

Perhaps I misunderstood you, but it sounds like you just defined away the possibility of systematic, correctable jury error, the very thing we have eg rules of evidence for.

Re: How A Lawsuit Over Hot Coffee Helped Erode the 7th Amendment

#88

Post by nemo »

stuki wrote: post #78
DanBC wrote: post #66

Earlier quoted context omitted.

People might expect coffee to be hot, but they do not expect the coffee to be hot enough to kill. She suffered full thickness burns. This is a significant wound. The burns were on her legs and genitals. That turns it into a medical emergency - rush to nearest hospital, let them stabilize you and send you to a different hospital that specializes in burns. Also, the car was not moving at the time of the accident.

Any coffee heated to the point where it is still drinkable at the end of a 20 minute commute, will be hot enough to kill if poured straight down your throat in one gulp. It is up to the customer to have some sort of clue. I am pretty sure that when granny makes coffee herself at home, she makes it at least as hot as McDonalds serves it. Whistling kettles and all. In a country of millions of people doing stuff, someti…

Tort reform boils down to "I know better than the Bill of Rights, because sometimes I don't like the way people exercise their rights." It's not much different than the thinking behind the cheerleading for other amendments being eroded.

McDonalds was egregiously horrible throughout the trial which is why they were hit with punitive damages. "Granny" wanted $20k for the medical expenses of an eight day hospital stay and lost wages. The jury watched McDonalds consciously weighing more than seven hundred reports of customers with medical injuries against others customers having a hot cup of coffee at the end of a long commute and saying they would live with people getting 3rd degree burns.

Also, even if your coffee is merely warm, rather than hot it's still "drinkable." If you are some coffee snob who wants a really perfect hot cup of coffee, you aren't drinking the swill McDonalds serves.

Re: How A Lawsuit Over Hot Coffee Helped Erode the 7th Amendment

#89

Post by Karunamon »

aaronem wrote: post #82
Karunamon wrote: post #74

Earlier quoted context omitted.

That tends to happen when you dump hot things where hot things shouldn't go. The same kind of idiocy that leads to the absurd list of obvious warnings on products that we all like to make fun of. Irons warning you not to use them on clothes you're wearing. Baby strollers telling you to remove the baby before collapsing it. Coffee cups telling you the contents may, indeed, be hot. Is the severity of the self-inflicted…

> What cements the case as being meaningless in my mind is the fact that they were not ordered to strengthen their cups or to brew at a lower temperature. And if such sanctions had been within the ambit of the jury empaneled, in a civil case, to consider the damages specifically due Stella Liebeck as remedy for her injuries, this statement might actually mean something. You know, you've got this hilarious sort of com…

I didn't necessarily mean as a direct action of the participants in the case. Corporations are often compelled to change their behavior regulatorily after losing a lawsuit for only monetary damages due to the findings of the case.

Instead, we get an obvious warning on cups to join the other few hundred obvious warnings.

Obviously the CPSC/FDA or their local/state counterparts (I'm not sure who would exactly be responsible for such regulation in this case) didn't see the need to get involved.

I don't know where you're coming up with "nanny statism".

I generally do not hold juries in great respect; they often rule on emotion rather than hard fact. But that is a rant for another time.

Have you any other thinly veiled insults you'd like to throw my way as a result of my communicating unclearly? If not, I think we're done here.

Re: How A Lawsuit Over Hot Coffee Helped Erode the 7th Amendment

#90

Post by Noishe »

ams6110 wrote: post #32
Tuna-Fish wrote: post #16

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> Coffee is brewed hot (195 - 205 degrees F), and I personally like it to be freshly brewed as I drink it. As I very carefully sipped my fresh Starbucks coffee today at the mall, Starbucks coffee is not served anywhere near that hot. By their corporate guidance, the normal acceptable range of temperature for coffee served to customers is 145-165F. If you poured that in your lap, it would be very unlikely for you to r…

Hm that must be why Starbucks drinks get cold so fast. Or maybe it's the paper cup. McD coffee in an insulated cup is still nicely hot by the time I get to work. When I make tea, or coffee with my Aeropress, I use boiling water right out of the kettle. I agree with GP, coffee should be HOT.

It will taste better if you use water that is at 90C or 194F.
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