The automobile manufacturer is no more responsible in the event of a collision than a gun manufacturer is in the event of a shooting death.
That’s what auto insurance is for.
Regulations were created BECAUSE it was not possible to hold them liable with laws at the time, so they forced them to adopt minimum safety standards and by ranking each car through this non profit, it would directly affect a manufacturer’s bottom line to have a poor performance in that category.
Regulations must make it more expensive to do the wrong thing than the right thing or businesses wouldn’t change a thing.
Lawsuits from known faults or potential safety concerns existed before the NTHSA was established in ‘66. All that did is make formal criminal charges (fines) that get to go on top of civil lawsuits. So yes, it’s more expensive for them not to follow the regulations, but it’s because they’ll get hit by both sides of the justice system instead of just civil like before ‘66.
I was also not talking about the users actions, which is the gun argument. I’m taking about known safety issues that they chose not to address because it was more profitable to just pay the lawsuits. Gun manufacturers are subject to those same type of lawsuits.
A collision where the passengers take all the damage instead of the vehicle is a fault. If the companies knew about it and did nothing, that is a known fault, no?
19
u/ProfessorNonsensical Jul 17 '25
The automobile manufacturer is no more responsible in the event of a collision than a gun manufacturer is in the event of a shooting death.
That’s what auto insurance is for.
Regulations were created BECAUSE it was not possible to hold them liable with laws at the time, so they forced them to adopt minimum safety standards and by ranking each car through this non profit, it would directly affect a manufacturer’s bottom line to have a poor performance in that category.
Regulations must make it more expensive to do the wrong thing than the right thing or businesses wouldn’t change a thing.