Michigan Court of Appeals; Docket No. 27582; Published
Judges Bronson, Cavanagh, and Byrns; Unanimous
Official Michigan Reporter Citation: 79 Mich App 218; Link to Opinion 
STATUTORY INDEXING:
Social Security Disability Benefits [§3109(1)]
General / Miscellaneous [§3109]
TOPICAL INDEXING:
Legislative Purpose and Intent
CASE SUMMARY:
In a unanimous decision which parallels the Court of Appeals' holding in O'Donnell v State Farm, 70 Mich App 487 and Wysocki v DAIIE, Docket No. 29314, August 22,1977, the Court of Appeals held that §3109(1) of the No-Fault Statute denies equal protection of the laws when applied to require subtraction of payable workers' compensation benefits from any recovery of personal protection benefits due under a no-fault policy.
In reaching this conclusion, the Court rejected the logic employed by the O'Donnell and Wysocki cases. Those cases based their holdings on a finding that distinguishing no-fault claimants on the basis of whether they receive collateral government benefits (which are subtracted from no-fault benefits) or privately purchased collateral benefits (which are not subtracted from no-fault benefits) was arbitrary and violative of equal protection. The Pollock case reasoned that there is logic in the distinction drawn between the two aforementioned classes—such a subtraction from no-fault benefits of collateral government benefits would further the legitimate legislative purpose of lowering premiums by the reduction of claims that duplicate other recovery while not producing the concomitant undesirable effect of discouraging the purchase of extra coverage no-fault policies which also help to reduce premiums.
The critical matter which compelled the Pollock Court to find §3109(1) unconstitutional was the Court's fear that the "subtraction rule” resulted in a discriminatory distribution of the premium savings sought to be achieved by §3109(1). The Court concluded that inasmuch as the lowered premiums are not made available to policyholders in proportion to the extent to which the workers' compensation coverage duplicates their no-fault coverage, the class of insureds entitled to such workers' compensation benefits is forced to subsidize premium savings by the greater class of all insureds who do not receive workers' compensation coverage. As the Court stated:
"To put the matter another way, worker motorists are forced to purchase insurance on which the law denies them a right of recovery, so that other insureds may enjoy lower premiums for insurance on which they can recover."
The Court found this to be an unconstitutional random redistribution of wealth.
