West Coast - there aren't enough passenger aircraft crashes to get a larger picture but if you look at general aviation, it is highly litigious in the US, there is a whole history of lawsuit in the aviation, there were actions of Congress to curtail this activity which hurt many companies, you can read about the so called tort-reform, etc, etc. So there is not just a 'conventional wisdom' because it is fact with long history, many aviation magazines wrote about it giving stats, even providing such data how much the original aircraft price is inflated to have buffer against lawsuits. If you want examples how crazy it still gets with absolutely frivolous lawsuits look at latest attempts to sue Cirrus Aircraft - after the Cory Lidle crash and after another crash in Minnesota. These were highly publicized crashes with lawsuits dragging for long years but there are many other which don't get front headline news. Fortunately Cirrus won both lawsuits but it took actions by state Supreme Court, nevertheless it costs millions to defend yourself, like I said, against mostly frivolous lawsuits.
Last edited by olasek; 13th Aug 2013 at 20:19.