Hawkins v. McGee: What the Hairy Hand Told Us About Expectation Damages in Contract Law Remedies
Channel: Business Law Education
Date: 2021-04-08

The famous Case of the Hairy Hand is more than just a good story. It's also a fundamental lesson in how courts thing about remedies for contractual breach. This case—available with my annotations at http://bit.ly/HairyHand—discusses why expectation damages are the usual remedy for a breach of contract, why punitive damages are generally unavailable under contract law, and more key lessons for lawyers and law students. This makes the case a good introduction into the study of contractual remedies in general and expectationary damages in particular.

1:00 Facts of the Case
2:26 The Trial Court's Legal Error
4:24 Calculating Loss in Value of the Hand: giving the injured party the expected benefit of the bargain
6:40 Difficulty of Calculating the Cost of Complete Performance
8:01 Why Loss in Volume Doesn't Make Sense Here
10:02 Reliance Damages: restoring the injured party to the position he would have been in if the contract were never made

Read the case at http://bit.ly/HairyHand