It is important to remember that pain and suffering awards are non-economic awards, and as such, are not affected by fluctuations in the economy. Furthermore, the effect of indexing the cap would be to drive up medical malpractice insurance premiums. These increases would trigger higher consumer health care costs and could cause a medical care availability crisis. Only a few civil justice systems in the world allow any recovery for non-economic damages. Those that do, leave the decision concerning damages with the trial judge.
None allow the jury to award unlimited recovery.
Unlike other states, liability concerns here have not discouraged huge numbers of California doctors from performing deliveries and high-risk surgeries. Increasing the cap, either directly or by indexing, could change this. The defending party has a powerful economic incentive to keep defense costs to a minimum. Imposing a limit on defense attorney fees would not result in more money going to the plaintiff. Finally, the fee limit has reduced the number of cases against public hospitals and other institutions in California, saving taxpayers untold millions.