How is my life expectancy used to calculate future damages in Georgia?

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Life expectancy sets the time horizon for most future-damages calculations in Georgia. Whether the question is how many years of attendant care, medical treatment, or device replacements a person will need, the projection runs across the years the person is expected to live, so the length of that expected lifespan directly drives the size of the award.

Setting the number of years

The longer the expected remaining lifespan, the more years of future care and the larger the projected economic loss. Georgia juries may consider standard mortality and life-expectancy tables as evidence of how long a person of a given age is expected to live. Those tables are a starting reference, not the final word. The evidence can be adjusted by an injured person’s specific health, because a catastrophic injury sometimes shortens expected lifespan, and at other times the person’s individual circumstances support a different figure than the table average.

How life expectancy shapes the math:

  • It fixes the duration of recurring future costs such as care and medication.
  • It frames the work-life period used for lost earning capacity.
  • It can be adjusted by expert testimony about the person’s actual condition.

Where the expert testimony comes in

Physicians may testify about how the injury affects the person’s expected lifespan, and an economist or life-care planner uses the resulting figure to project costs across that period. These opinions are subject to O.C.G.A. § 24-7-702, the reliability standard Georgia courts apply through the Daubert framework, so any departure from the standard tables needs a sound medical basis.

From a lifetime projection to a present-day award

Once future costs are spread across the expected lifespan, the future stream is reduced to present value. O.C.G.A. § 51-12-13 lets the jury make that reduction using a 5 percent or other appropriate discount rate, turning a multi-decade projection into a single present-day figure.

The bottom line

In Georgia, life expectancy defines the time frame over which future damages accrue, drawing on mortality tables that expert testimony can adjust for the person’s actual condition. That expected lifespan, combined with a present-value reduction, converts a lifetime of anticipated losses into the amount a jury awards today.

This article is for general educational and informational purposes only and is not legal advice. It does not create an attorney-client relationship, and Georgia law may change. For advice about a specific situation, consult a licensed Georgia personal injury attorney.

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