Comparative Negligence vs. Contributory Negligence

Being in an accident is tough enough,

but depending on which state the accident takes place,

can determine how much money you can recover

from another driver or another insurance company.

In this video,

I'm going to talk about negligence

and the difference between comparative and contributory negligence.

Before we get started,

I want to invite you all to subscribe to the channel

to stay informed and learn more about your insurance policies.

So, to start,

what is negligence?

Negligence basically means your actions caused harm

or a loss to another individual.

For example,

if you rear end another driver,

you are 100% negligent for that accident

and your negligence would be that you were not paying enough attention to the road

and keeping enough distance between you and the driver that was in front of you.

Now there are two types of negligence,

comparative negligence and contributory negligence.

Comparative negligence

looks at the drivers involved in an accident

and asks the question,

did one driver's actions cause the accident

more than the other drivers?

For example,

if two vehicles are backing out of a parking space

and they back into each other

and the damages to the back bumpers of each of the vehicles

under the law of comparative negligence,

both drivers would share the responsibility and recover

50% of the damages from the other driver.

This

is an example of pure comparative negligence,

and each driver can recover money from the other party

in the amount in which they are not at fault.

So, with this same example,

let's say that driver 1's damages came to be $800

and driver 2's damages came to be $600.

Since both drivers are 50% liable for the accident,

driver 1 can recover $400 for their damages.

And driver 2 can recover $300 for their damages.

Now,

comparative negligence laws also have what they like to call modifiers,

and the modifiers can vary depending on the state that you live in.

The modifiers will restrict how much money you can recover from another driver

or the insurance company,

depending on your percentage of fault for the accident.

Each state

that adheres to the modified comparative negligence laws

follow either the 50% bar rule

or the 51% bar rule.

12 states follow the 50% bar rule,

meaning a damaged party cannot recover if it is 50% more at fault.

But if it is 49% or less at fault,

it can recover for its damages.

21 states follow the 51% bar rule

under which a damaged party cannot recover if it is 51% or more at fault.

Now under the 50% bar rule,

if a driver is 49% or less at fault,

they can recover their damages,

but

how much they can recover is reduced by how much they are at fault for the accident.

The same thing goes for the 51% bar rule.

If a driver is found to be 50% or less at fault for an accident,

they can also recover,

but the amount that they can recover from the other driver

is also reduced by the amount that they are at fault for the accident.

So, for example,

if driver 1 and driver 2 were involved in another accident

and driver 1 is 70% at fault for the damages

and driver 2 is 30% at fault,

let's say if driver 1's damages came out to be $1000

and driver 2's damages came out to be $300.

Let's also say that this accident took place in Colorado.

One of the states that follows the 50% bar rule.

Given that driver 1 is 70% at fault for the accident,

they will not be able to recover any of their damages from driver 2.

But since driver 2 is only 30% at fault for the accident,

they can recover 70% of their damages from driver 1.

Now let's take the same accident underneath the 50% bar rule

and say that both drivers were 50% at fault for the accident.

Underneath the 50% bar rule,

neither driver will be able to recover from one another.

But under the 51% bar rule,

both drivers will be able to recover 50% of their damages.

Most states follow comparative negligence laws,

but they differ between pure and modified comparative negligence.

The chart and the video will show which states follow which particular laws.

This chart here is a good reference guide

to which states follow either pure or modified

comparative negligence laws.

Now let's go to contributory negligence.

Contributory negligence

looks at drivers that are involved in an accident and ask the question,

did each driver contribute to the accident taking place?

If a driver contributed to the accident taking place,

then they cannot recover any money from the other party.

So, for example,

if two vehicles are backing out of a parking space

and they back into one another

under the law of contributory negligence,

both drivers share the responsibility

and cannot recover their damages from the other driver.

In this example,

both drivers would be at least 1% at fault

and under contributory negligence laws,

neither driver can recover from the other party.

Only the District of Columbia and 4 other

states practice in pure contributory negligence laws,

and they are Alabama,

Maryland,

Virginia,

and North Carolina.

So, this has been the basics of negligence

and the difference between comparative negligence and contributory negligence.

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