Liability Insurance, Moral Luck, and Auto Accidents
Document Type
Article
Publication Date
2008
Abstract
Beginning with the seminal work by Williams and Nagel, moral philosophers have used auto accident hypotheticals to illustrate the phenomenon of moral luck. Moral luck occurs in the hypotheticals because (and to the extent that) two equally careless drivers are assessed differently because only one of them caused an accident. This article considers whether these philosophical discussions might contribute to the public policy debate over compensation for auto accidents. Using liability and insurance practices in the United States as an illustrative example, the article explains that auto liability insurance substantially mitigates moral luck and argues that, as a result, the moral luck literature is unlikely to make a significant contribution to this public policy debate. That debate would benefit more from philosophical analysis of victims' luck, which is not as substantially mitigated by liability insurance
Keywords
insurance, moral luck, philosophy, automobile, torts
Publication Title
Theoretical Inquiries in Law
Repository Citation
Baker, Tom, "Liability Insurance, Moral Luck, and Auto Accidents" (2008). All Faculty Scholarship. 2338.
https://doi.org/10.2202/1565-3404.1172
Publication Citation
9 Theoretical Inquiries in L. 165 (2008).