Hacker News Reader

Comment by oneoff786 | Hacker News Reader

Do you not feel it’s a problem to be charging 48k to litigate a 2k issue regardless of the chance to recoup it?

This is the way the justice system is set up. I don’t really dig into whether this is a systemic problem.

I’m not charging my client 48k. I’m recording my time spent working the case. If I have to spend 100 hours working on a case, and my hourly rate is $500 an hour, and we win, then the attorneys’ fee award should be $50,000, regardless of whether the claim is $100 or $100,000.

This is an important component of civil rights litigation. Often times does claims have small value (in terms of damages). But we want to incentivize competent lawyering, and so, if you prevail, you get an award of attorneys’ fees.

The same is true in this context. If you don’t have a provision like that, then consumers are left without recourse. As it is, there are very few lawyers who practice in this area as is.

Ok but if you lose, your client gets $0 and owes you $50k. No? And if you settle?

He works on contigency. That is a 'no cure no pay' system.

No. It’s a contingency fee. My client isn’t paying me hourly. If we lose, we both get $0. This is how lots and lots of plaintiff litigation works, if you’re not familiar. Those guys advertising for car accidents on billboards are not charging you an hourly rate.

As plaintiff’s attorneys, we take cases we believe in, we spend our money to prosecute the case (I almost always pay that $200 AAA filing fee for my clients), and then we get paid out on the back end. In my personal opinion, it’s a much more appropriate compensation method, because it puts our interests firmly in line.

Based on the very limited understanding I have of this case, if we settle, I’m targeting a 10k settlement and taking a percentage of that (a percentage smaller than the client), and so my client is getting 5k+.

Why don’t you charge 1,000 an hour then?

Courts do lodestar calculations to determine if the hourly billing rates/number of hours were appropriate.

don’t charge $1000 an hour, because, ultimately the fee charged must be “reasonable.“ Now, as a boy who grew up lower middle class, the idea that an hour of my time is worth $500 or more as part of these calculations is something that I still struggle with. But my rates are in line with my peers, what the system considers to be a reasonable rate, and consistent with my experience and education. But at $1000 an hour, most judges will call BS. Again, I didn’t make the system, I’m just surviving in it

Since you work on contingency, the $500/hr is also compensating you for the risk that it will turn out to be $0/hr, right? Or do you pretty reliably get to a settlement that involves your full fee being paid?

It would be far more reasonable if you had to pay the other side's fees if you lost

Many jurisdictions outside the US do (much more readily) award fees so that the loser has to pay the winner's legal costs.

The disadvantage of it is that if you're just some guy against a BigCo, then instead of risking having to pay your own $50k lawyer bill you're potentially risking having to pay their $5M lawyer bill.

Fees can be capped by offering a settlement. The court will not allow you to ignore a reasonable settlement and then charge fees for work done after. “Reasonable” is defined by a better or similar outcome to what you got in the end by continuing litigation.

What about capping fees at whatever the party having to pay spent on their legal team, so the party choosing to pay more expensive lawyers for more hours is taking the risk on that increased cost vs. the other, and the less you spend on your side the less you're liable to pay if you lose?

We have a system where lawyers cannot charge contingency fees. I guess the rationale is founded upon lawyers being perceived as 'officers of court', and the expectation of ethical conduct. When money is a factor, boundaries of ethical conduct tend to be hazy. while you owe a duty to the client, you also owe certain duties to the court/tribunal and even to the adversaries- including duty of fairness.

It is interesting to note that while some of the U.S. rules of professional conduct states that a lawyer shall represent a client "zealously", such a requirement is missing in our code of conduct rules.

Contingency based, so no result = no charge.

Well... I consulted a civil rights attorney about some rights violations. I was told that if the damages are really small, then the federal judges don't look favorably on reimbursing attorney fees.

On a side note, my experiences with the legal system is that it's a complete shit show full of incompetent and even crooked players (DA, police, magistrates, judges). If for no other reason, you have to hire a lawyer because a lawyer can more readily detect the incompetence, and the incompetent people are more likely to accept stuff coming from a credentialed person.

There is some truth to this. The courts are becoming hesitant to make the massive attorneys fees awards that were more commonplace in the past (1,000 damages and 200,000 in fees).

But, generally speaking, everyone is still on board for realizing that at the end of the day the attorneys fees award will probably be the biggest part of the award.

The fact is, as soon as judges stop giving out those attorneys fees awards, you’re going to stop having attorneys pursuing these civil rights cases. That’s the bottom line.

As a legal system, and as a society, we have to ask ourselves whether these civil rights violations are a priority or concern or not.

The goal of obtaining justice for the client is rather different than the goal of maximizing legal fees

The goal is also to create an incentive for the company to behave appropriately (legally) in the future. A few low-cost losses is not going to do that.

The goal is social justice, not just individual justice.

High cost losses won't necessarily do that either.

The fallacy is that these transactions have to be financial.

They don't. Any number of other remedies - from jail time downwards - would provide a stronger deterrent.

Without strong deterrents and the threat of even more expensive class action - possibly leading to personal ruin - individual losses can be written off as a cost of doing business.

Generally the sanctions for bad behaviour are far too light, and strongly biased towards business owners over customers/victims.

The Sackler/Purdue story is a perfect example. Inconceivable levels of harm were caused - far more harm than a high profile terrorist attack. But the Sackler family is still worth billions. And no one is going to jail.

Generally agree. Companies can mitigate the costs through insurances and just passing on costs to customers.

The goal is to produce a relatively low-cost way to resolve reasonable disputes while eliminating opportunities for fraud and bad actors.

A formal written complaint prior to filing for abitration might have been equally effective. Incentivizing escalation simply drives up the costs of resolving disputes.

"As a legal system, and as a society, we have to ask ourselves whether these civil rights violations are a priority or concern or not."

For "minor" violations, they are not a priority at all. At least that's my experience and what I was told by that lawyer as well. If nobody in the system will enforce or defend your rights, then do you really even have those rights?

> If nobody in the system will enforce or defend your rights, then do you really even have those rights?

Nobody is a stretch. They can be enforced, just at great expense. So some people can defend those rights; others can’t.

We can’t extend this to the latter not having the rights because people intervene on behalf of others’ legal cases all the time, there are non-profits set up to do this (e.g. the ACLU and EFF) and some wealthy retired lawyers’ pass times.

The police don't, the DA doesn't, the judges don't - they are the main actors in the system. The civil rights attorneys and ACLU only take on the biggest issues due to constrained resources. Same with the DOJ Civil rights division.

> police don't, the DA doesn't, the judges don't - they are the main actors in the system

Most civil rights violations aren’t criminal offences. It literally isn’t the police or DA’s job.

That's just describing the problem.

Supposedly their job is to seek justice. Trampling people right, even if civil offenses, is something they aren't supposed to do. In fact it's their job to not violate those rights and take steps to mitigate their impact if they do occur. Violating those rights can undermine any criminal case they're working on.

Philosophically, sure. But legally, not at all.

"But legally, not at all."

Color of law violations...

Are you an attorney with experience with color of law violations, or just a citizen with an idea of what "should be correct" in a court of law? The American justice system is extremely convoluted. It's already been explicitly explained to you that "Most civil rights violations aren’t criminal offences. It literally isn’t the police or DA’s job". If you think there is a chance of changing this through "color of law" violations, I highly encourage you to seek counsel and pursue it - it would be a massive win! But, any lawyer worth their salt would tell you that it would be an impossible case and that you have a massive misunderstanding of how the justice system works.

You're completely misunderstanding the conversation here.

Did you see the quote about "legally, not at all"? This is easily identified as false. There are criminal charges in at least 4% of civil rights cases.

On top of that, we aren't just talking about charging some. We're talking about the idea that protection of civil rights is part of the job for police and prosecutors. This is also easy to prove. Police are required to Miranda-ize before interrogation, the agency they work for is required to investigate IAD complaints without being hostile to the complainant, etc. Prosecutors are required to maintain Guiglio lists, follow Brady for exculpatory evidence, etc. These are clearly defined examples of where the actors are in fact legally required to take steps to protect one's civil rights.

Do they sometimes violate these? Sure. The point is that it is in fact their job to ensure they are not violating people's civil rights. The reason they get away with it is that there's no real oversight, and even the civil cases are overseen by judges who are also part of the system and inevitably have biases to support the other members of that system.

True, but US legal fees are quite literally off the scale compared to the rest of the world. There isn't a country where lawyers siphon off so much, individually and collectively.

Do you have any numbers to back this up? $500/hour doesn't seem that insane to me for an expert's time.

I don't know. I'm an expert (at some things, anyway), and I make $68 an hour. Maybe an attorney isn't billing 100% of the time, but if they billed six hours a week they'd make more than I do. That feels like a lot of money.

I assume that's your wage from an employer, and that's a totally different number. If that's your freelance fee, you are seriously being underpaid. After paying taxes, fees, insurance (both personal and business), anything less than $200/hour for skilled labor (not even expert professional) is a steal.

That's a good point; I'm not a contractor. I doubt my total compensation comes anywhere close to $200 an hour, though. When I was briefly a contractor last year I believe the total amount paid from the contractee to the contracting firm was closer to $150 an hour.

I think my pay is normal for my title ("ML engineer"), location (Cincinnati), and experience (master's, 10 years in the workforce). Though I wouldn't turn down a substantial pay raise ...

A few years ago, we were billing at $98/hr total comp. This was for employees at the company for total cost to the company.

What region are you located in (approximately)? I have some intuitive idea that compensation differs according to location, but I haven't done any in-depth study into it.

I was a contractor from 2013-2018, though at that point I was more a generalist than I am now. I don't know what USAF paid my company for me but my take-home maxed at $29 an hour, so $98 would have been more than sufficient. With my paltry raise this year compared to inflation I'll be back to my old pay in real terms before you know it.

No, your total comp is probably no near 200, but what if your company was farming your work out? How much would they charge the client for your time? When my small company brings in consultants, it's usually at $100-150 per hour. $200 would be a tough sell, but it's not outside the realm of possiblitiy. $500 is a lot, but but lawyers usually produce results, and as described here, they don't get paid unless you do, so they have to make up that money somewhere.

Seems high to me. I don't pay that much for a doctor, or a plumber, mechanic, etc.

You almost certainly pay far more than 68 an hour for a doctor! (How long are you actually with the doctor?). Plumbers and mechanics are paid at a significantly lower rate than doctors and lawyers!

The question was $500/hr. A 30 minute appointment is about $150. Still less than $500/hr with considerably more overhead.

Where did that $68/hr number come from?

I have no idea? Brain fart. doctors also get paid by the procedure, so charge less for simple office visits (it’s complicated because of how medical billing works)

Yes I do. I've had some lawsuits in the USA, some in Europe and the cost of the US lawsuits absolutely dwarfed the ones in Europe.

It's not that $500/hour isn't 'insane' (it actually is, but that goes for the profession as a whole), it's how much time ends up being billed for a case and US lawyers really are experts at running out the clock, and working the system to the point where the legal fees themselves become a weapon in the case (see the excellent examples in this thread illustrating that).

Oh, and to add to this: I also had the distinct feeling that in the US I was often billed at 'partner' rates when the work done was at 'paralegal' level and I always wondered what would happen if you were to audit a large legal office to see if there was more partner time billed than there was partner time to begin with.

> This is the way the justice system is set up [...] we want to incentivize competent lawyering [...].

Except as you yourself point out upthread it's not really an incentive for competent lawyering per-se, rather it's an incentive for costly lawyering.

I.e. a reason for why someone might retain your services is partly or entirely because it gives the defendant a greater incentive to settle.

I mean, if the company thinks the consumer’s lawyer is a clown, then they’re going to assign a probability of having to pay those attorney’s fees at or near zero. Then you’re back to them valuing the case lower.

But I also get/agree with your point. Please don’t read any of my comments here as an impassioned defense of lawyers or the legal system in general. Just, generally, having a competent lawyer, can drive better outcomes in these cases.

To illustrate: I had a spat with a big dutch telco provider for a 6 figure sum, they gave me the runaround and 'what are you going to do, we're big and you're small' until they got a letter from one of the largest legal offices in NL and they folded on the spot and paid up.

Better lawyers really do drive better outcomes. If the other party is worth suing (a calculus that many people seem to skip).

Well, an incentive for costly lawyering might translate into an incentive for competent people to go into the profession, which does incentivize competent lawyering.

Also, since the counterparty is basically making a financial decision (rather than a moral decision), costly lawyering is competent. The price is part of the service.

It incentivizes lawyers who prefer expensive lawyering.

Competence is an orthogonal question.

Lawyers are basically mercenaries engaged in trial by combat, abstracted to an exchange of relevant facts and opinions.

It's not obvious that a battle between mercenaries is the best way to get a just result.

Considered systemically, lawyers also control legislation.

While it would be better for consumers to have much stronger protections, the people who make money out of weak protections are not incentivized to argue for stronger laws which would reduce their billable hours.

But those profits that you are generating are ultimately passed onto the consumer. They just don’t materialize out of thin air on a companies balance sheet.

Just take a look at what is going on in Florida with litigious , shady roofing contractors, they have nearly collapsed the homeowners insurance market.

Also, that's Florida's government being incompetent as usual. Also, no homeowner insurance company can be profitable in the long run (a decade) in Florida with rising sea levels, climate change, and other compounding factors.

The flip side of this is that the sometimes the judge will not award you attorney's fees even though it's a reasonable ask. I've sued companies three times in my life, and only one out of those three times was I awarded attorney's fees, even though it was requested all of those times.

Not to go into too deep of details, I'll also say if you ever do business across an international border, even with a company that is headquartered within walking distance of where you live, they /will/ find a way to weasel out of responsibility, even if they have a signed contract saying they're responsible. Once any sort of business crosses an international border, the only way you can hold a multi-national company responsible is if you represent a government that is an ally of the US and can bring to bear full military force, otherwise they /will/ screw you over.

In fact, the primary component of my debt post-college was paying back attorney's fees for cases I had won (or had won / appealed several times until I settled because I could no longer afford to pay for attorneys).

Personally, I am a major supporter of the idea we should have it be written into law that the party that doesn't prevail is responsible for attorney's fees for both parties automatically. That said, I also understand that this could be disastrous for smaller entities suing larger entities if they lose (to which I mostly say... don't file frivolous suits).

Lots of good thoughts here. All I'll say/add is that there is a wide chasm between a losing suit and frivolous suit.

There are legal issues that I will argue the exact same twice, and, depending on the judge, win one and lose one. If I have to pay for the attorneys fees of the other side for the one I lost, I'll be filing 0. No justice for anyone.

What about lawyers working on contingency?

If I am not paying my lawyer, aren't we incentivised to charge (approaching) infinity, even if it's just a way to inflate the cost?

Do you not feel it's a problem to be charging $50k for a piece of software on a $.20 medium?

I don’t understand this question. What’s a 20 cent medium?

The CD the software is sold on. It's like the old "why did I pay you $100 to turn a valve?"

You're not paying for the CD, the valve turning, etc, you're paying off the time built for the expertise and background engineering.

The $100 valve-turning story never quite worked for me and I finally figured out why.

It's not that you're paying him $100 for the expertise to know which valve to turn, it's that there's no one standing next to him who could reliably for $50 or even for $99 know which valve to turn.

You're not paying for his expertise so much as for the scarcity of his expertise.

Yes, the guild of valve-turners ensures it

Also availability, he came running when you had a problem because he stands to make $100, offer him $10 and maybe he can pencil you in next month.

Do people still write software for discs outside of console games? I don’t think this comeback is very clever either way. Being paid $100 for a product worth $1000 in total sales is pretty reasonable. Being paid $50k to resolve a $2k seems to be a very unusual outcome. It just raises the stakes of the case by 25x.

It seems very unreasonable that a losing party could need to cover so much from their opponents end especially as they get no say in the total stakes.

If it was you paying $50k to your lawyer regardless of whether or not you won, sure, that’s just your choice. This is a $50k extra being thrown at your opponent and there’s no incentive to be reasonable about it because it sounds like your own client doesn’t get hit with it. Idk if it applies in this context but if it goes both ways then you’ve got a prisoners dilemma. Spending more on lawyers increases the probability of winning, but also increases the total pot of lawyer money. That’s so fucked up.

I would vote for you’re liable for at mode the amount you spent on lawyers personally. If they do 50k on a 2k issue and you don’t even get a lawyer, you may lose 2k but they lose 50k. Incentives to escalate lawyer fees sounds stupid as shit to society.

> Being paid $50k to resolve a $2k seems to be a very unusual outcome. It just raises the stakes of the case by 25x.

You are paying for protection of consumer rights, not to be lied to and not to be swindled. What are those rights worth to you?

As a company you always have a chance to come to amicable agreement with the customer before the lawyers got involved. Every time you tell a customer to piss off you take the risk that they might take you to court.

As explained elsewhere, the fees are contingent. You’re not paying the 50k at all, unless something unexpected happens, in which case you’re suddenly paying 50k which you were told wasn’t going to be your problem.

But it’s really bad that it’s ok for lawyers to basically encourage you to rack up contingent lawyer expenses. It’s just a toxic system.

You missed the contingency angle.

Not in the post you’re responding to. In some others, yes.

It's fairly standard for this kind of lawsuit. Precisely because of what the GGP stated, it wouldn't make sense otherwise.

But that’s still shit. The lawyer is incentivized to charge as much as he can because the person hiring him isn’t the one who pays it. That’s fucked up.

That I agree with, see my other comment somewhere in this thread.

So what's your solution so that large enough companies that they have lawyers on retainer don't just ignore any $10,000 or less liability, if you in fact think that a 5x multiplier in lawyers fees is excessive?

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Q6RK4479XD8 ?

I think he was referring to a USB stick. The point of the question is that you pay for the work not for the single piece of outcome.

That software didn't magically appear. The development had a cost. The software itself has a value that purchasers provide to the seller. You aren't paying for a medium with some random bits.

Huh. Sounds like the attorney's time, too.

Yep, very much so!

Would the software itself be any more valuable if it was engraved on solid gold?

No. It doesn't really matter what medium the software is on. Its value is independent of that.

Sounds fine an dandy when it's "stick it to the big evil corp that has revenues in the hundreds of millions", but a side-effect is that it'll make insurance and legal costs higher for smaller (and potentially very honest) companies.

Except that if the company did what it was obligated to do under the contract there would be no lawsuit, and if there was one the company would win.

And in the case that they did do what was obligated and win the case with 100 hours worth of lawyer time spent? Will the small party pay the lawyer fees for the company?

Their lawyer would spend some time regardless of whether the other party's lawyer was there or not. Sure, they may have to answer some filings or produce something (I don't really know the rules and procedures of arbitration) but again, a competent person without an attorney would come close to that anyway.

If the lawyer loses on contingency after spending 100 hours, nobody pays them; that lawyer eats the loss.

But it’s super shit that a lawyer can say “you can either give my client 2k or have a chance at giving my client 2k and me 50k”

That’s just so fucked up.

I've been thinking about it, and I think it's mostly a balancing of the scales - the company sets the initial terms of the contract almost every time, and has a completely disproportionate amount of power in the relationship. This is a bit more of a spin the other direction, but it still doesn't quite get there.

Yeah, it's fucked up, but it's a response to the company being able to do more things that are fucked up and doesn't come out of nowhere.

Reply on news.ycombinator.com