The local lawsuit epidemic is a crisis

The local lawsuit epidemic is a crisis


Corporations should be held accountable when they cause people legitimate harm, period. But corporations should not be targeted for baseless lawsuits brought by profit-motivated, entrepreneurial plaintiff attorneys acting on behalf of municipalities. When this happens, all of us — victims, employers, consumers, and our economy — suffer the consequences.

Too often, local governments are cash-strapped. Attracted by the prospect of fattening their bottom line, too many local government units are being recruited by litigators to become partners in lawsuits designed to gain high-dollar restitution for alleged corporate misconduct. Working on a contingency fee basis, the plaintiff attorneys bring suit for a wide variety of societal ills, from opioid abuse to climate change.

This legal business model is similar in intent to mass tort litigation, the rapidly growing segment of the legal system in which enterprising attorneys, typically bankrolled by hedge

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