Dublin Core The Dublin Core metadata element set is common to all Omeka records, including items, files, and collections. For more information see, http://dublincore.org/documents/dces/. Title A name given to the resource Department of Justice Emails Description An account of the resource The Department of Justice received more than 11,000 e-mails in response to the agency's public solicitation for comments upon its plans to distribute the September 11th Victim Compensation Fund of 2001 established by Congress to benefit the victims of September 11 and their families. These e-mails have been organized here by date. September 11 Email September 11 Email: Body The basic content, as unstructured text; sometimes containing a signature block at the end. January 23, 2002 VIA FACSIMILE: 301-519-5956 Mr. Kenneth Feinberg Special Master, Sept 11th Federal Victim's compensation Fund Office of Management Programs Civil Division U.S. Department of Justice Main Building, Room 3140 950 Pennsylvania Avenue Washington, DC 20530 Dear Mr. Feinberg: As a professional actuary and a relative of someone widowed by the atrocities of September 11th, I would like to make a few comments on the interim Regulations which you have proposed for the September 11th Federal Victim's Compensation Fund. I have not been able to find the complete actuarial assumptions that were used to create the proposed presumptive settlement amounts so I am limited to a few issues that were spelled out in the proposed regulation. The one of most significant assumptions in the calculation of the economic loss is the earnings level of the victim. The tables are based upon the average earnings for the years 1998-2000. This will often be representative of the victim's earnings for the middle year of that range, 1999. Since the economic loss is measured by the lost income from essentially 2002 and later, this "base" salary starting point is 2 or 3 years out of date, depending upon when you start applying the salary increase percentages. This would mean that your economic loss amounts would on average be 10-15% too low. In particular cases, the average earnings for 1998-2000 could be most unrepresentative of the victim's earnings capacity. In most situations, the best estimates of a person's current earnings capacity is their actual current earnings! I suggest that the starting point be based upon the annualized 2001 earnings. This might save you and the victim's families much time and effort in presenting and resolving disputes. A second adjustment that I would like to suggest is based upon the timing of the payment. The law provides for claims to be made up to December 22, 2003 and payments to be made within 120 days. Thus it is possible that some payments could be made almost 2 1/2 years from the date of the loss. It would be appropriate to add interest (at the rate used to discount future earnings) from approximately September 11, 2001 to the date of payment. In fact it would be improper to discount future earnings back to 2001 if the payment is to be made in 2002 or 2003 or even 2004. If further details of the calculations were made public, I might make other suggestions. If desired, I'm sure that you could call upon volunteers from the Society of Actuaries to assist in the process or review the procedures. I would like to close with a general comment. When Congress passed the law establishing the September 11th Federal Victims' Compensation Fund they also limited the ability of the victims to recover damages by alternative means. Victims must relinquish the right to bring lawsuits upon application to the Fund. These facts argue for a liberal interpretation of the law and giving the benefit of the doubt to the victims when deciding upon the assumptions for the calculations of economic and non-economic losses. I don't think Congress meant to penalize the September 11th victims versus others in other situations who have the right to pursue claims in court. At least I don't think any of them would admit to that. Cordially, Individual Comment Brooklyn, NY September 11 Email: Date The local time and date when the message was written. 2002-01-23 Dublin Core The Dublin Core metadata element set is common to all Omeka records, including items, files, and collections. For more information see, http://dublincore.org/documents/dces/. Title A name given to the resource dojP000111.xml 911DA Item Elements describing a September 11 Digital Archive item. Status The process status of this item. approved Consent Whether September 11 Digital Archive has permission to possess this item. full Posting Whether the contributor gave permission to post this item. yes Copyright Whether the contributor holds copyright to this item. yes Source The source of this item. born-digital Media Type The media type of this item. email Created by Author Whether the author created this item. yes Described by Author Whether the description of this item was submitted by the author. no Date Entered The date this item was entered into the archive. 2002-01-23