As the coronavirus outbreak in the U.S. approaches the beginning of its sixth month, Congress continues to debate whether and to what extent the federal government should provide further economic support, relief, and stimulus. The House of Representatives and the Senate recently have proposed two very different coronavirus relief packages and efforts to reconcile the policy differences reflected in the two different approaches have to date not been successful. But while it remains to be seen what if anything ultimately may emerge, among the critical aspects of the proposed packages worth considering are the liability shield provisions in the proposed Senate package. The Senate liability shield bill, if enacted, could significantly diminish the potential liabilities of businesses and other organizations for the transmission of the COVID-19 disease in their facilities. These liability restrictions could have significant implications for these organizations’ liability insurers as well. And, as discussed below, the adoption of the kinds of liability restrictions that the Senate has proposed could have implications – at least indirectly —  for the organizations’ D&O insurers, too.
Continue Reading Potential Impact of Proposed Coronavirus Liability Shield

Columbia Law School Professor John C. Coffee, Jr.

On February 10, 2017, as I noted in a recent post, Rep. Bob Goodlatte of Virginia introduced a bill in Congress seeking to introduce a number of reforms to class action litigation. In the following guest post, Columbia Law School Professor John C. Coffee, Jr. provides his views regarding the reforms proposed in the bill. A version of this article previously appeared on the CLS Blue Sky Law blog (here). I would like to thank Professor Coffee for his willingness to publish his article as a guest post on this site. I welcome guest post submissions from responsible authors on topics of interest to this blog’s readers. Please contact me directly if you would like to submit a guest post. Here is Professor Coffee’s article.
Continue Reading Guest Post: How Not to Write a Class Action “Reform” Bill