Opinion ID: 2591026
Heading Depth: 3
Heading Rank: 1

Heading: Prospective Application Applies to All Future Payments

Text: ¶ 14 For any future payments, as defined above, regardless of the date of injury, our ruling applies. At oral argument counsel informed the court that the Employers Reinsurance Fund has corrected its practice and is already making future payments in accordance with our ruling. It was represented to us, however, that the Workers Compensation Fund has, at least in some instances, continued the practice we held unconstitutional in Merrill. Instead of disregarding the unconstitutional offset, the Workers Compensation Fund is apparently still including the offset in calculating and making future payments to the affected class of injured workers. It defends this practice in reducing these future payments by reference to the date of the worker's injury, rather than by reference to the date of Merrill's publication. This practice misunderstands prospective operation. No one may take offsets for payments made after the date of our ruling. If an ongoing stream of future payments exists from and after April 24, 2009, our ruling applies to them.