If your injuries arise from the negligence, recklessness, or malice of someone else, such as in a car accident or a truck accident or an assault and battery, we generally break down damages into two categories: There are economic damages and non-economic damages.

Economic damages are best described as injuries to your pocketbook, and those injuries consist of things like medical expenses, wage loss, the cost of repairing a vehicle, and the cost to replace damaged or destroyed property. Economic damages also include future expected losses such as projected wage loss and/or lost earning capacity.

Non-economic damages can best be described as damages to your psyche or to your heart. Noneconomic damages are intangible and usually invisible. However, they are often more painful and costly than economic damages. Noneconomic damages are often described as pain and suffering and emotional distress. Examples of noneconomic damages are physical pain, mental suffering, and almost any adjective you can use to describe loss of enjoyment of life caused by an incident.   For example, noneconomic damages might be described as sadness, depression, anxiety, feelings of betrayal, hopelessness, helplessness, frustration, and grief.

What to look for in a personal injury attorney.