You know what rarely rises to the top of my “to do” list?  Reading scholarly articles and studies about arbitration.  Blech.  But, since I haven’t seen any good court decisions lately, it is time to visit the neglected pile of articles.  Turns out, I should have read some of them right away.  Below are summaries of five new-ish articles that have crossed my desk.  A few offer peeks into arbitration data that is generally not available and some conclusions to chew on over this Thanksgiving holiday.

First is “Arbitration Nation,” an empirical study of 40,775 consumer, employment and tort cases filed with four different arbitration providers between 2010 – 2016 (AAA, JAMS, ADR Services and Kaiser).*   The data came from two sources: public data that the State of California requires arbitration providers to file, as well as a cache of data  gathered by the New York Times.  After reviewing the data, the authors conclude: 1) arbitration is faster that court litigation and generally more affordable for plaintiffs; 2) there was no surge in arbitration filings after the Concepcion decision, but there is evidence of at least a few mass-individual filings (same law firm filing 200 – 1300 individual arbitrations against the same defendant in the same time period); 3) plaintiffs win at a lower rate in arbitration than in court, and pro se plaintiffs “struggle mightily” in arbitration; and 4) the concerns about “repeat-player bias” are “well-founded” — but those repeat players are both defendants who appear often, as well as plaintiffs-side law firms who appear often.  For example, within the JAMS set of data, the authors report that a consumer’s probability of winning increased 79.9% if it was represented by a “super repeat-player” law firm (as compared to appearing pro se), and an employee’s probability of winning increased 55.1% if he was represented by a “high-level” repeat player firm.  (See pp. 42-43.)  Read this article if you: want to compare JAMS and AAA (on cost and speed); want to see data on how Concepcion affected arbitration filings; or want to see statistical evidence of “repeat player” bias.

Second, “Inside the Black Box” reflects findings from surveys of construction arbitrators, advocates, and industry representatives.  Although some of the survey findings just confirmed what most people would expect (like party-appointed arbitrators are not always neutral), there are some unexpected nuggets.  For example, I found it interesting that 68.5% of construction arbitrators report allowing depositions in “regular” sized cases, and 88.9% of arbitrators report allowing them in large, complex cases.  And 75% of arbitrators allow prehearing subpoenas.  Furthermore “advocates prefer more discovery than arbitrators are allowing in … cases in which claims are below $1 million.”  (p. 59)  Furthermore, the authors say “summary judgment motions in construction arbitrations perhaps have been over-criticized.  If a healthy majority of 63.7% of arbitrators found they were useful half the time or more..it is hard to argue their use should be constrained.” (p. 65)  I also like this one: 44.6% of the arbitrators who responded said that evidentiary objections have no impact on their view of the evidence or their deliberations.  So, stop shouting “Objection: hearsay” in arbitration! Read this article if you: are a construction litigator and want to understand the norms in this industry’s arbitration practice.

Third, “Arbitration in the Americas” reports findings from surveys of arbitration “practitioners” across the Americas.  Amusingly, of the 212 U.S. respondents, 60.45% describe legislators as “having a Low or Very Low understanding of arbitration.”  In keeping with the “Arbitration Nation” study above, “U.S. respondents reported that arbitration in the United States is faster than litigation, with 44.32% describing it as Slightly Faster, and a further 43.24% describing it as Much Faster.” (p. 60)  More surprisingly, “U.S. respondents overwhelmingly described arbitration as on average cheaper than litigation, with 49.19% describing it as Slightly Cheaper and a further 22.70% describing it as Much Cheaper.” (61).  Read this article if you want to compare perceptions of how well arbitration works and is supported in this country with perceptions in other countries.

Fourth, “The Black Hole of Mandatory Arbitration” argues that between 315,000 and 722,000 potential employment arbitrations are “missing in action”.   As the abstract states: “The great bulk of employment disputes that are subject to [mandatory arbitration agreements] simply evaporate before they are ever filed. They are “MIA,” or “missing in arbitration.” That conclusion emerges from a comparison of the tiny number of employment claims that are filed in arbitration with an estimated number of claims one would expect to see given the number of employees who are covered by MAAs and the volume of employment litigation by those who are free to litigate.”  Read this article if you like public policy and are concerned about current SCOTUS jurisprudence.

Fifth, “Running It Twice“, proposes new types of baseball arbitration, in which separate arbitrators (or panels) decide the same dispute to ensure no rogue result.  Read this article if you like shiny new things and sports analogies.

*You didn’t read that wrong; the article’s name is the same as this blog.  I gave them permission.

Happy Thanksgiving all!