[dsfyu404ed]

What is this, 1995? You're gonna need more than airbags and seat-belts and fuel efficiency.

Modern cars need ABS, TPMS, electronic stability control, passenger airbags, a backup camera and crash test standards all but demand side curtain airbags.

Don't get me started on emissions. Fuel economy really isn't a big deal or hard to meet. It's the half million other little things that need to be in a specific range that really waste the R&D time and money.

For something like a low end subcompact compliance is a huge chunk of the price.

Given the choice between a 1999 Toyota Solara (or whatever) which has one or two airbags for $5k or a new subcompact hatch with none of the listed safety features for $6k or $7k I'd probably take the subcompact. There's been huge improvements in all sorts of non-safety aspects of vehicle design in the past ~20yr that the subcompact has that the old sedan doesn't.

There's rapidly diminishing returns for regulating cars because by driving up the price of new cars you extend the time that the old ones stick around and the people who choose less safe alternatives (see mopeds in Asia)

Saying "regulation that mandates $goodthing is good" as a blanket statement is approximately of the same dumbness as saying "regulation is bad" as a blanket statement.