Retaining an economist in a traumatic brain injury matter means building the engagement around the other experts' inputs. The post-injury earnings path comes from the neuropsychological and treating opinions and from vocational findings supplied by other experts; the future care comes from a life care plan; the household services and supervision hours come from the family's account and the plan. The economist's scope should name each input, its source, and its expected date, so the records request and the report deadline are sequenced correctly and the components reconcile with one another.
Checklist
Run the conflict check and set a scope that names each input and its source
Request the earnings history and, for a young person, the school and training records that define the but-for path
Confirm the schedule for the neuropsychological, treating, and work-capacity opinions
Obtain the life care plan with its item-level tables, or the date it will be delivered
Document the supervision and household work now supplied by family members
Questions to ask the economist
How do you reconcile attendant care and supervision hours in the plan with the household services claim?
How do you build the but-for path for a student or a worker with a short history?
What growth rate do you apply to the plan's care categories, and how do you support it?
How do you handle a post-injury path that involves supported work or reduced hours?
Timeline
About one week for retention and the records request, then two to four weeks of analysis after the records, the work-capacity opinion, and the life care plan arrive, then one to two weeks for the draft and final report.
Required documents
Tax returns, W-2s or 1099s, pay stubs, or school and training records
Employer benefit plan documents
Neuropsychological, treating, and work-capacity opinions
The life care plan with item-level frequencies, durations, and unit costs
A description of the supervision and household work now provided by family
Common pitfalls
Retaining the economist with no plan for who supplies the post-injury work capacity; where the record has none, that input is coordinated with a vocational specialist rather than assumed by the economist
Delivering the life care plan after the economic report deadline
Valuing supervision hours in the plan and household services separately for the same time of day
What happens if the life care plan changes after the economic report is issued?
The economist revalues the affected items and issues a supplemental report. The engagement letter should anticipate at least one revision, and the report should tie every valued item to a plan line so the change can be traced.
In what order should the experts' reports be scheduled?
The neuropsychological and treating opinions first, then the work-capacity opinion, then the life care plan, and the economic report last. Each of the economist's inputs comes from one of those, and a report issued before them rests on placeholders that will have to be revised. The engagement letter should record the expected date of each input.
What does the economist do if the life care plan and the family's account overlap?
Reconciles them before valuing either. Where the plan already prices attendant care or supervision for certain hours, the household services claim is limited to the tasks and hours outside those, and the report states how the reconciliation was made. The alternative, valuing both in full, invites a double-counting objection that can discredit the whole report.
References
U.S. Bureau of Labor Statistics. (n.d.). Occupational Employment and Wage Statistics (OEWS). U.S. Department of Labor. bls.gov
U.S. Bureau of Labor Statistics. (n.d.). Consumer Price Index: Medical care [Fact sheet]. U.S. Department of Labor. bls.gov
Skoog, G. R., Ciecka, J. E., & Krueger, K. V. (2011). The Markov process model of labor force activity: Extended tables of central tendency, shape, percentile points, and bootstrap standard errors. Journal of Forensic Economics, 22(2), 165-229. doi.org