Forensic Economics Timeline and Turnaround

The analysis and modeling, because every damages category claimed is a separate stream to build: the earnings base has to be established from the records, the fringe benefits valued, the household services priced, the worklife and discount assumptions applied, and the present value computed with a sensitivity range for each. Data collection and the draft are short by comparison when the records arrive together.

Missing earnings documentation is the usual cause: tax returns for some years, a benefits statement or a post-injury pay history that has not been produced hold the earnings base, and nothing downstream can be modeled without it. An unfinished vocational or life care opinion delays the categories that rest on it, and an opposing report served late adds a rebuttal phase after the draft.

Rush turnarounds are accommodated case-by-case. An expedited economic analysis needs the earnings records complete at engagement, the vocational or life care findings it depends on already final, and room on the economist's calendar. What a rush does not change is the sensitivity analysis: the report still shows the range across the worklife, growth and discount assumptions, so the saving comes from the inputs arriving together.

After the underlying opinions are final, with the full window still ahead of the deadline: an economic analysis is typically 30 to 60 days from receipt of complete records, and the vocational or life care report it rests on has its own timeline before that. Allow time for a rebuttal once the other side's economist reports, and for revisions if the vocational opinion is amended.

Mostly in sequence, because each phase feeds the next: the earnings base has to be established before growth and worklife assumptions can be applied, and the present value cannot be computed before both. What overlaps is the collection of records for later categories while the earnings analysis is under way, and the rebuttal or supplemental analysis, which runs whenever the opposing reports arrive rather than in a fixed slot.