After a long illness, Eli Schwartz passed away on August 31, 2010, at the age of 89. Eli was a charter member and a vice-president of the National Association of Forensic Economics during its early years and MacFarlane Professor of Economics (emeritus) at Lehigh University.

A graduate of Brown University, he joined the Lehigh faculty in 1954, where he taught for 37 years until his retirement. Over this period of time he wrote or edited seven books, including Theory and Application of the Interest Rate (Praeger 1993), Trouble in Eden: A Comparison of the British and Swedish

Abstract

After examining the competing perspectives regarding single person consumption, this paper makes an effort to improve the quantification of economic losses in cases involving the wrongful death of single persons. I show a new disaggregation of the Consumer Expenditure Survey microdata source which is then used to calculate various economic loss measures warranted by legal jurisdiction and economic thought. Traditional personal consumption methodology computes economic losses as the decedent's earnings multiplied by one minus a personal consumption rate. This paper adds a new method of computing economic losses as the decedent's earnings multiplied by the percent of survivors' or estate's benefit from those earnings. Significant differences result between the methods and in the personal consumption amounts between males and females and wage-earners and non-wage earners of retirement age. It was also discovered that some single-person maintenance consumption results may be applicable to married persons.

Abstract

This paper updates the Skoog-Ciecka (2001) worklife tables, which used 1997–1998 data, and the Krueger (2005) worklife tables, which used 1998–2004 data. The present paper uses data generated by the methodology Krueger devised in his 2003 PhD dissertation. We have pooled the data beginning January 2005 and continuing through December 2009, a period of five years, using observations matched a year apart. Thus, we have roughly four times the data in the first of the previous studies, and about that of the second. We chose this period for a variety of reasons, including recency, business cycle and trend considerations. The result is the most current and disaggregated set of worklife tables, along with extended probability calculations and statistical measures available to forensic economists.

Abstract

This article presents the legal framework for computation of economic damages in the Commonwealth of Virginia. Attention is given to the case law and statutory provisions governing damages for personal injury and wrongful death actions. The categories of damages are reviewed with specific consideration given to Virginia law's limited judicial precedent, conservative tort law, and evidentiary requirements for admissibility of expert testimony to establish economic loss. Included in the discussion is an analysis of law controlling the establishment of future losses.

In Memoriam, Eli Schwartz, Lehigh University

Personal Consumption and Single Persons

Abstract

The Markov Process Model of Labor Force Activity: Extended Tables of Central Tendency, Shape, Percentile Points, and Bootstrap Standard Errors

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Assessing Economic Damages in Personal Injury and Wrongful Death Litigation: The Commonwealth of Virginia

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Mothers’ Worklives and Marital Status

Personal Consumption and Single Persons: An Update

A Closer Look at Race, Ethnicity, and Gender Neutral Models

Life-Cycle Estimates of Earnings Growth by Education and Gender

Assessing Economic Damages in Personal Injury and Wrongful Death Litigation: The State of Montana