Court Opinion

ID: 9769296
Source: CourtListenerOpinion
Date Created: 2023-08-29 14:43:59.033452+00
Date Added: 2024-06-11T15:36:47.234881
License: Public Domain

STEPHENSON, Justice
(concurring).
Even though the dissent, as now drawn, contains the statement that no dissent is made to the conclusion reached by the majority as to the “class” of other employees, much is said by indirection.
After stating there is doubt as to the validity of such conclusion, it is observed in such dissent that a part-time able-bodied worker is now a full-time disabled worker. Then, the point is made that the other employees, who worked 210 days during the preceding year, were paid on an hourly basis, while plaintiff was compensated on a piece-work basis. The inference is left that payment by such different methods places plaintiff in a different class so that subdivision two is inappropriate.
The appellant attempts to place a meaning upon the term “of the same class” that no appellate court in this state has ever given it before. All of the cases I have found limit the meaning of that term to the type of work being done, and no suggestion has been made that it is intended to describe the type of person the claimant is. See: Central Surety & Insurance Corporation v. Jordan, 410 S.W.2d 60 (Tex.Civ.*669App., Amarillo, 1966, no writ); Blankenship v. Royal Indemnity Co., 128 Tex. 26, 95 S.W.2d 366 (1936); Texas Employers Ins. Ass’n v. Ebers, 134 S.W.2d 797 (Tex.Civ.App., Amarillo, 1939, dism. judgm. cor.); Travelers Insurance Company v. Woodall, 356 S.W.2d 344 (Tex.Civ.App., El Paso, 1962, error ref. n. r. e.); Pan American Insurance Company v. Stokes, 370 S.W.2d 955 (Tex.Civ.App., Amarillo, 1963, no writ).
To attempt to follow the appellant’s contention would lead the trial courts of this state into such morass of problems that the trial of compensation cases would become exceedingly difficult when a claimant had not worked 210 days before the accident. Proof that there was, or that there was not, another employee of the same class as claimant, who worked at least 210 days during the preceding year, would present too many obstacles. Such factors as the age of the claimant, whether young or old; and the part-time employee, whether after school, during the summer, or other seasonal workers — all would have to be considered.
It is my opinion that the wording of the statute clearly indicates the term of the same class refers to the type of work being done, and no other meaning is intended. It is the wage-earning capacity which is protected by the compensation act. Even though the claimant in the case before us may have been limiting his earnings at the time this cause of action arose, he should be free to change his mind just as done by the claimant in the Nored Case.
The jury in the case before us, after finding that another employee of the same class as the plaintiff worked at least 210 days during the preceding year, then found the average daily wage of such employee to be $16.00. No complaint is made about the latter finding. All of the evidence in the record shows the average daily wage of this plaintiff, and other employees of the same class, was at least $16.00 per day. The defendant has not been harmed if the computation is done either by the hour or by the load.
I join with Chief Justice DIES in affirming this case.