Opinion ID: 2216158
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Heading: Whether Awards for Future Pain and Suffering Should be Reduced to Present Value.

Text: Plaintiff objected to the trial court's jury instructions No. 20 and No. 25 to the extent that they required the jury to reduce the recovery for future pain and suffering to present value. That objection was overruled, and the jury was instructed that all elements of future damage should be reduced to present worth. Plaintiff contends that this was reversible error with respect to elements of noneconomic damage. In reviewing the authorities on this issue, it appears that the overwhelming weight of decided case law favors plaintiff's position. So does Restatement (Second) of Torts section 913A (1979). This section of the Restatement provides: The requirement of reduction to present worth applies to future pecuniary losses in general, but it arises most frequently with personal injuries. If earning capacity has been lost or impaired, the future losses in earnings are discounted. So also with damage awards covering future medical expenses; the payment of them at the future date will be a pecuniary loss. But an award for future pain and suffering or for emotional distress is not discounted in this fashion. Id. (emphasis added). Cases holding that awards for future pain and suffering and other noneconomic losses should not be discounted to present worth include the following: Flanigan v. Burlington N., Inc., 632 F.2d 880, 886 (8th Cir.1980); Taylor v. Denver & Rio Grande W. R.R., 438 F.2d 351, 353 (10th Cir.1971); Beaulieu v. Elliott, 434 P.2d 665, 676 (Alaska 1967); Braddock v. Seaboard Air Line R.R., 80 So.2d 662, 667 (Fla. 1955); Bagley v. Akins, 110 Ga.App. 338, 138 S.E.2d 430, 431 (1964); Barlage v. The Place, Inc., 277 N.W.2d 193, 195 (Minn.Sup.Ct. 1979); Dickerson v. St. Louis S.W. Ry., 697 S.W.2d 210, 212 (Mo.App.1985); Ball v. Burlington N. R.R., 672 S.W.2d 358, 361 (Mo. App.1984); Porter v. Funkhouser, 79 Nev. 273, 382 P.2d 216, 218-19 (1963); Friedman v. C & S Car Serv., 108 N.J. 72, 527 A.2d 871, 873 (1987) (citing O'Byrne v. St. Louis S.W. Ry., 632 F.2d 1285, 1286 (5th Cir.1980)); McKenna v. State, 112 A.D.2d 996, 492 N.Y.S.2d 805, 807 (1985); Missouri Pac. R.R. v. Handley, 341 S.W.2d 203, 205 (Tex.Civ. App.1960); Borzea v. Anselmi, 71 Wyo. 348, 258 P.2d 796, 804 (1952); see also United States v. Harue Hayashi, 282 F.2d 599, 605 (9th Cir.1960). In Flanigan, the United States Court of Appeals for the Eighth Circuit, applying federal law under the Federal Employers Liability Act, 45 U.S.C. § 51 et seq., determined the issue as follows: The same amount of pain and suffering does not occur from year to year nor can the degree of pain and suffering that will occur in any year be quantified with any degree of certainty. Requiring the reduction of an award for pain and suffering to its present value would improperly allow a jury to infer that pain and suffering can be reduced to a precise arithmetic calculation. 632 F.2d at 886. In considering this conclusion, we would also note that, in addition to the inexact quantification of pain, there is an absence of a precise time of occurrence from which a discount formula may be calculated. The appellees urge that, notwithstanding the results of courts in other jurisdictions, Iowa law requires that all future elements of recovery be reduced to present worth, including noneconomic damages. They cite the case of Schnebly v. Baker, 217 N.W.2d 708 (Iowa 1974), as authority for that contention. The present worth issue before this court in the Schnebly case concerned whether future economic damages were required to be reduced to present worth when they were computed on current prices rather than future prices and there was evidence that the rate of inflation would approximately equal the rate of return on money. We held that, if the evidence as to the inflation rate was believed, this would result in inflation canceling out the economic return on the accelerated receipt of future damages. The theory of canceling out applied in the Schnebly case to avert the need to discount future damages to present worth was illustrated by examples involving the economic damages in the case. It would appear that this theory would not excuse the failure of a court to discount noneconomic damages to present worth if that is required. Yet, it is clear from the record in the Schnebly case that the district court did not reduce future noneconomic damages to present worth and the judgment was affirmed. Based on these circumstances, we are unable to conclude that Schnebly is authority for the proposition that future noneconomic damages must be reduced to present worth. We elect to follow the rule that prevails in most jurisdictions and hold that awards for future noneconomic damages such as pain and suffering and emotional distress need not be reduced to present worth.