Danzon (1984) analyzes aggregate data at the state level on medical malpractice claims. She ...nds that legal rules favoring plainti¤s had an important impact in increasing the frequency of medical malpractice claims but not the average payment made on such claims. Also, increased use of medical services and urbanization explain a large portion of the growth in medical malpractice litigation, perhaps indicating that larger plainti¤ verdicts in urban areas affected expectations of potential plainti¤s, shifting the demand for litigation in these areas. With lawsuit level data, the shift in legal rules over time could be used as a test of case selection hypotheses. Unfortunately Danzon’s data set does not di¤erentiate between claims with respect to case disposition, so that the di¤erences in quality or success across tried and settled cases cannot be examined.

Kakalik, et. al. (1988) measure compensation amounts in aviation accident lawsuits for over 2000 cases ...led between 1970 and 1984. They ...nd that claims settled without a suit had an average compensation of $256,200. Claims that resulted in a lawsuit but were settled before trial averaged $387,600, while those that went to trial averaged $599,000. Although case ...le data were available for their study, the authors do not take the amount requested initially in the claim or lawsuit into consideration as a predictor of ...nal payment. As in the case of medical malpractice, which motivates much of the empirical work on litigation, aviation accident plainti¤s experienced a shift in legal rules in their favor during the time period studied. However, aviation litigation is somewhat peculiar in that it rarely consists of a dispute over liability, but rather focuses almost exclusively on damages. In addition, the underlying informational structure of the bargaining process between plainti¤ and defendant may di¤er in important ways between aviation litigation and medical malpractice suits.

Dertouzos, et. al. (1988) use data on 120 jury trials of wrongful termination cases in California between 1980 and 1986 to study the consequences of major shifts away from the employment at will doctrine in many states. The information from each jury trial includes the award, subsequent alterations of the award through appeal or post-trial settlement, as well settlement o¤ers made before the initial trial. The amount of compensation claimed initially by the plainti¤ is not observed. The average award over all cases was $436,627, while the average settlement o¤er made by the defendant was $30,000. Since every case in this data set went to trial, the settlement o¤ers observed constitute failures to reach agreement. Hence these data do not allow measurement of the selection e¤ect of going to court. When defense costs are considered, straightforward calculations show that for cases with initial demands in the top three quartiles, defendants would have been better o¤ on average accepting settlement demands, which averaged $207,710. Barring irrational behavior by ...rms or severe informational asymmetries, this may indicate that ...rms decide to go to trial to build a reputation that would deter future litigation in general or low-quality litigation in particular.

Black, et. al. (2005) investigate trends in medical malpractice litigation in Texas using a database including all closed medical liability insurance claims over 15 years. Claims in this data set may be ...led by insured medical profession9