Economic damages are the specific, calculable dollar amounts you can recover for the financial losses directly caused by your injury. These are the "hard costs" that can be proven with receipts, bills, pay stubs, and other documentation, making them relatively straightforward to calculate compared to other types of compensation. Economic damages include your medical expenses (past and future), lost wages from time off work, reduced earning capacity if you can't return to your previous job, property damage like car repairs, and other out-of-pocket costs directly related to the accident.
The key feature of economic damages is that they represent actual money you've lost or will lose because of your injury, rather than compensation for intangible harm like pain and suffering. For example, if your medical bills total $25,000, you missed six weeks of work worth $6,000, and your car repairs cost $8,000, your economic damages would be at least $39,000. Unlike non-economic damages that can be capped by state laws, economic damages typically have no limits - you can recover the full amount of your proven financial losses, which is why it's crucial to keep detailed records of all expenses related to your injury.
