On Plaintiff Preferences Regarding Methods of Compensating Lawyers

Abstract

This paper analyzes a litigation contest in which the plaintiff’s lawyer and the defendant choose effort. The plaintiff selects the relative importance of a contract component related to the judgment (similar to contingent fees) and a component related to the lawyer’s efforts (similar to conditional fees) to ensure lawyer participation and guide the lawyer’s decision-making. For our setup, we find that the plaintiff considers the component related to the lawyer’s effort to be the relatively more desirable instrument in the light of its effort-inducing and cost characteristics. However, high levels of the lawyer’s outside utility may limit the role of this component.