What Minnesota law lets an injured person recover: the categories of damages

Minnesota has no single damages statute. The categories are assembled from the No-Fault Act's definitions, the punitive damages statute and its procedural gate, the interest statute, the death statute, and a body of case law about derivative claims.

There is no Minnesota statute titled “damages” that lists what an injured person may recover. The categories are assembled from several places that were written at different times for different reasons, and the assembly is worth doing once because the rest of this site refers back to it.

Economic and noneconomic, and where the line is drawn by statute

The division most people have heard of — economic losses on one side, pain and suffering on the other — is not a general Minnesota statutory division. It is drawn precisely in one place, the No-Fault Act, and the definition there is worth reading because the phrasing is broader than the shorthand.

Minn. Stat. § 65B.43, subd. 8:

"Noneconomic detriment" means all dignitary losses suffered by any person as a result of injury arising out of the ownership, maintenance, or use of a motor vehicle including pain and suffering, loss of consortium, and inconvenience.

Two things about that definition. It uses “including,” which signals a non-exhaustive list rather than three categories. And its reach is fixed by subd. 1, the scope provision: the words defined in § 65B.43 carry those meanings “for the purpose of sections 65B.41 to 65B.71,” which is the No-Fault Act. It is the term the tort threshold in Minn. Stat. § 65B.51, subd. 3 operates on, and the tort threshold guide works through how those five gates function. Outside a motor vehicle case the definition is not the operative one.

The other half of the No-Fault vocabulary — basic economic loss benefits, and what the two buckets under them pay — is set out in the no-fault guide.

Derivative claims

A person other than the injured person can hold a claim arising from the same injury, and Minnesota’s leading case on the point is also the case that created the claim.

Thill v. Modern Erecting Co., 284 Minn. 508, 170 N.W.2d 865 (1969), overruled a rule barring a wife’s action for loss of consortium caused by negligent injury to her husband. The opinion describes the interest, at 510: “‘Consortium,’ as a general description, represents reciprocal rights inherent in the marital relationship of husband and wife, including such undefined elements as comfort, companionship, and commitment to the needs of each other.”

The holding, at 513, states the right and its conditions in a single sentence:

The rule that we establish today is that the wife of a husband injured as the direct result of the negligence of another shall have a right of action against that same person for her loss of consortium, subject to these essential conditions: (a) Because we hold her right of action to be a derivative right, she may recover only if her husband recovers from the same defendant; (b) because we deem it an indispensable safeguard against the danger of double recovery, she will have her cause of action only if it is joined for trial with the husband's own action against the same defendant; and (c) because the wife's action for lost consortium is so much based upon impairment of marital relationship, were it to continue in the future, any award for her loss of consortium shall be joined in judgment with that of her husband, except only if she shall specifically declare to the jury her insistence for judgment in her own name alone.

Two features of the opinion carry forward. It is derivative, which is why it rises and falls with the injured person’s own claim. And the court was preoccupied with duplication, directing that a trial court “should carefully caution the jury that any loss to the wife of her husband’s material support is fully compensated by any award to him for impairment of his lost earnings and that the burden of his disability upon her performance of her normal services to him may be compensated to one but not to both.” Thill also declined to extend the claim to children, reasoning from what it identified as the predominant element of the interest.

Where the defendant is a public body, a derivative claim shares the individual cap rather than adding to it. Minn. Stat. § 466.04, subd. 2 provides that “The limitation imposed by this section on individual claimants includes damages claimed for loss of services or loss of support arising out of the same tort,” and Minn. Stat. § 3.736, subd. 4 carries the same rule, referring to “this subdivision” rather than “this section” — so in the municipal statute the limit is imposed by the whole section, and in the state statute by subdivision 4 alone.

Punitive damages, and the gate in front of them

Punitive damages in Minnesota are governed by a statute that sets a standard, a second statute that sets a procedure, and a rule of trial structure inside the first.

The standard. Minn. Stat. § 549.20, subd. 1(a): “Punitive damages shall be allowed in civil actions only upon clear and convincing evidence that the acts of the defendant show deliberate disregard for the rights or safety of others.” Subdivision 1(b) defines the phrase:

A defendant has acted with deliberate disregard for the rights or safety of others if the defendant has knowledge of facts or intentionally disregards facts that create a high probability of injury to the rights or safety of others and:

(1) deliberately proceeds to act in conscious or intentional disregard of the high degree of probability of injury to the rights or safety of others; or

(2) deliberately proceeds to act with indifference to the high probability of injury to the rights or safety of others.

Employers and principals. Subdivision 2 does not let respondeat superior do the work. Punitive damages may be awarded against a master or principal for an agent’s act “only if” the principal authorized the doing and the manner of the act; the agent was unfit and the principal deliberately disregarded a high probability of unfitness; the agent “was employed in a managerial capacity with authority to establish policy and make planning level decisions for the principal and was acting in the scope of that employment”; or the principal or such a managerial agent “ratified or approved the act while knowing of its character and probable consequences.”

The measure. Subdivision 3 lists what an award is measured by, and the list is long and specific: the seriousness of hazard to the public, the profitability of the misconduct, its duration and any concealment of it, the defendant’s awareness of the hazard and of its excessiveness, the defendant’s attitude and conduct on discovery, the number and level of employees involved in causing or concealing the misconduct, the defendant’s financial condition, “the total effect of other punishment likely to be imposed upon the defendant as a result of the misconduct, including compensatory and punitive damage awards to the plaintiff and other similarly situated persons, and the severity of any criminal penalty to which the defendant may be subject.”

Trial structure. Subdivision 4 splits the trial on request of any party: the trier of fact first determines whether compensatory damages are to be awarded, and “Evidence of the financial condition of the defendant and other evidence relevant only to punitive damages is not admissible in that proceeding.” Punitive damages are then determined in a separate proceeding. Subdivision 5 requires the court to review any award against the subdivision 3 factors and to make specific findings, and requires the same of an appellate court.

The pleading gate. Minn. Stat. § 549.191 is one paragraph and it is the provision most often described incorrectly:

Upon commencement of a civil action, the complaint must not seek punitive damages. After filing the suit a party may make a motion to amend the pleadings to claim punitive damages. The motion must allege the applicable legal basis under section 549.20 or other law for awarding punitive damages in the action and must be accompanied by one or more affidavits showing the factual basis for the claim. At the hearing on the motion, if the court finds prima facie evidence in support of the motion, the court shall grant the moving party permission to amend the pleadings to claim punitive damages. For purposes of tolling the statute of limitations, pleadings amended under this section relate back to the time the action was commenced.

Punitive damages are also expressly available in one place people do not expect: Minn. Stat. § 573.02, subd. 1 closes its damages sentence with “Punitive damages may be awarded as provided in section 549.20.” How a death claim is brought is covered in the wrongful death guide.

And they are unavailable against a public body. Minn. Stat. § 466.04, subd. 1(b): “No award for damages on any such claim shall include punitive damages.” Minn. Stat. § 3.736, subd. 3 ends its list of exclusions with “The state will not pay punitive damages.”

Interest, which is a damages category people forget

Minn. Stat. § 549.09 supplies two different kinds of interest and they run on different rules.

Interest from the time of a verdict, award, or report until entry of judgment is added by the court administrator or arbitrator under subd. 1(a). Interest after entry accrues under subd. 2 until the judgment is paid.

The one that changes numbers materially is preverdict interest under subd. 1(b), and its starting point is not the injury:

Except as otherwise provided by contract or allowed by law, preverdict, preaward, or prereport interest on pecuniary damages shall be computed as provided in paragraph (c) from the time of the commencement of the action or a demand for arbitration, or the time of a written notice of claim, whichever occurs first, except as provided herein. The action must be commenced within two years of a written notice of claim for interest to begin to accrue from the time of the notice of claim.

Five categories are excluded from preverdict interest by the same paragraph: workers’ compensation judgments, awards, or benefits, “but not including third-party actions”; “judgments or awards for future damages”; “punitive damages, fines, or other damages that are noncompensatory in nature”; judgments or awards not in excess of the amount specified in § 491A.01; and the portion of any verdict, award, or report founded on interest, costs, disbursements, attorney fees, “or other similar items added by the court or arbitrator.”

The same paragraph also runs an offer-and-counteroffer mechanism. If either party serves a written offer of settlement, the other may serve a written acceptance or counteroffer within 30 days. The prevailing party receives interest from the commencement date “only if the amount of its offer is closer to the judgment or award than the amount of the opposing party’s offer.” If the losing party’s offer was closer, the prevailing party receives interest only on the lesser of the offer or the judgment, and only until the time that offer was made. Later offers and counteroffers supersede earlier ones.

The rate depends on the size of the judgment and on who the defendant is. Under subd. 1(c)(1)(i), for a judgment or award of $50,000 or less — or for or against the state or a political subdivision regardless of amount, or in a family court action — the rate is simple interest set annually by the state court administrator from the one-year constant maturity treasury yield, “rounded to the nearest one percent, or four percent, whichever is greater.” Under subd. 1(c)(2), for a judgment or award over $50,000 other than one for or against the state or a political subdivision, the rate is ten percent per year until paid.

Future damages get a hearing of their own

Minn. Stat. § 549.25 is short, easy to miss, and structural:

Where a claimant is awarded an amount representing future damages greater than $100,000, the court shall hold a hearing prior to ordering entry of judgment to allow the claimant to consider whether payment of the future damages over time as the damages are incurred is in the best interests of the claimant.

The section lists three factors the court may consider — the claimant’s financial ability to meet obligations likely to be incurred as a result of the injury, the advantages of voluntarily entering into a structured settlement, and “the interests of the claimant in self-determination over the claimant’s financial affairs” — “as well as any others as justice requires.” If the claimant decides structured payments are in the claimant’s best interests, the court “shall make available information to assist the claimant in seeking an appropriate financial instrument,” and the section closes with a hard stop: “Judgment may not be entered until the claimant has notified the court that the claimant does not wish to enter into a structured settlement.”

The categories are not the number

Two mechanisms sit between the categories described above and what an injured person actually receives, and both are covered elsewhere on this site because both are large enough to need their own treatment.

Statutory subtractions and the fault percentage. Minn. Stat. § 65B.51, subd. 1 requires a court in a motor vehicle negligence action to deduct the value of basic or optional economic loss benefits paid or payable, and Minn. Stat. § 548.251 requires a collateral source reduction; both are applied before the claimant’s comparative fault percentage under Minn. Stat. § 604.01, subd. 1, while advance payments credited under § 604.01, subd. 5 come off afterward. The sequence and its consequences are set out in the comparative fault guide.

Repayment rights. Health plans, hospitals, Medicare, Medical Assistance, and workers’ compensation insurers each have a different mechanism for taking money out of a recovery, on different terms and with different limits. The repayment guide works through them.

Where more than one party is at fault, a further question arises about how much of the total any one defendant can be made to pay. That is the subject of the multiple defendants guide.

What this page is not

It is a map of the categories Minnesota law recognizes and the statutes that create, condition, and limit them. It does not value anything, does not estimate what any category is worth in any case, and does not say which categories are in play in any particular matter. Damages are proved with evidence, and no page can substitute for the evidence.