Car accidents, spinal cord injuries and lost wages

Among the injuries that individuals can suffer in car crashes are spinal cord injuries. Statistics indicate that, since 2005, nothing has been responsible for more spinal cord injuries in the U.S. than auto accidents.

There are many ramifications that a spinal cord injury can have for a car accident victim. For one, it could impact their employment situation quite a bit.

The high potential of spinal cord injuries to have employment implications on their victims can be seen in statistics. Reportedly, at the time of their injury, around 57.5 percent of spinal cord injury victims have employment. When you go to a year after the injury, the percentage plummets to 11.5 percent. When you go out to 20 years after the injury, the percentage recovers a bit, rising to 35.4 percent; however, it still remains well below the time-of-injury employment rate.

Losing time in the workforce due to a spinal injury can cause a person to miss out on quite a bit of wages. Such wage losses can have all kinds of financial ramifications for a spinal injury victim and their family.

Now, lost wages are one of the things that can be addressed in compensation matters related to spinal-cord-injury-causing auto crashes. One of the types of damages that a person can pursue in injury claims related to car accidents caused by someone else’s negligence are damages for lost wages. Skilled lawyers can advise individuals who have suffered a spinal cord injury in a car crash on what sorts of compensation-related actions they can take in connection to the impacts of the injury, including employment-related impacts.

Source: Becker’s Spine Review, “10 spinal cord injury statistics,” Adam Schrag, Feb. 22, 2017