Difference hypothesis (law)

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The difference hypothesis is a term used in German property damage law .

The term goes back to the Kiel legal scholar Friedrich Mommsen , who introduced it in 1855 in his work On Doctrine of Interest and is still the starting point for the legal assessment of financial losses. The difference hypothesis states that damage consists in the difference resulting from two goods layers. The situation of goods that was actually created by the damaging event and the situation of goods that would exist if the damaging event were ignored are compared. If the current actual value of the property of the injured party is lower than the value of the previous one - without the event triggering the obligation to pay compensation - there is financial loss.

literature

  • Friedrich Mommsen : To the teaching of the interest . In: Contributions to the Code of Obligations , Schwetschke, Braunschweig, 1855

Remarks

  1. ^ Otto Palandt : Bürgerliches Gesetzbuch . CH Beck, 73rd edition, Munich 2014, ISBN 978-3-406-64400-9 , preliminary to § 249 Rnr. 8th.
  2. ↑ See BGHZ 27, 183; 75 371; 99, 196; see. also in NJW 94, 2357; BAG NJW 85, 2545).

See also