How this estimate is built
Your medical expenses and lost wages are your economic damages. We apply the multiplier method, the industry-standard approach, to estimate noneconomic damages — then check whether any cap genuinely applies, which in Pennsylvania depends entirely on who the defendant is.
A 51% bar that favors the claimant at the exact threshold
Under 42 Pa.C.S. § 7102, Pennsylvania bars recovery only when a claimant's negligence is greater than the defendant's. At exactly 50% fault, a claimant still recovers half of their damages — only fault above 50% bars recovery entirely. Separately, Pennsylvania courts have not uniformly treated assumption of risk as covered by this comparative negligence framework; framed as a "no duty" analysis, it can still entirely preclude recovery in some premises liability cases.
A constitutional ban on capping damages against private defendants
Article III, Section 18 of the Pennsylvania Constitution bars the legislature from limiting the amount recoverable for injury or death, except in workers' compensation cases. The Pennsylvania Supreme Court confirmed in 2014 that this provision prohibits capping the liability of private defendants — there is simply no constitutional path to cap compensatory damages against a private doctor, hospital, business, or individual in Pennsylvania, no matter how the legislature might try to write such a law.
A different story for government defendants
That constitutional protection applies only to private defendants. Pennsylvania does cap damages recoverable against government entities — $500,000 against a local or municipal agency, $250,000 against a state agency — justified under a separate sovereign immunity theory the 2014 ruling specifically carved out from the private-defendant protection.