The regulations don't take into account market reality. People don't want to buy cars because they're low-emission, they want to buy cars because they're fast, big, and safe. They need to be bigger, faster, and safer in order to compete. But lowering emissions makes that much more difficult. So of course you're going to lie on emissions. If you don't, your competitor will, and then you lose market share.
What would regulations look like that took market reality into account?
The whole point of regulations is to go against what the market will buy without them. If people bought low emission cars without any outside forces then you wouldn’t need any regulations. Of course, in reality that path leads you to smog-choked cities and lots of dead people.
The "Big Cars" part of your comment is really US-centric. In Europe, Japan, and other places, many people want small cars.
Some people want faster but most people don't care because there are speed limitations on the roads anyway.
Low-emission might not be a priority, but people still think of it, and some governments measures target the most-polluting vehicles to discourage their use.
Which is why we need make the punishment fit the crime. The problem is, an appropriate and fitting punishment is going to be painful for a large number of people completely associated with the crime.
If we want companies to follow the law, then those that violate emissions standards should face harsh punishments. For example, they could be banned from selling vehicles in the US market for one year, all of their lineup should need recertification under more strict oversight, and they be required to fix or buyback the offending vehicles. And personal liability for senior executives.
The major problem the US has with all automotive regulations is GM and Ford get their lobbyists to write the laws with loopholes that cater to them. For example, CAFE standards that are based on vehicles footprint and are different for passenger cars vs. "light trucks." While the regulations are "fair" on paper, but in practice, they are much more lax for the types of vehicles domestic automakers sell.
> People don't want to buy cars because they're low-emission, they want to buy cars because they're fast, big, and safe
You forgot the two biggest factors - cost and efficiency. Most people doesn't want big or necessarily fast cars. Most people want cheap cars that go a long way on a little fuel. However, it's difficult to make cars that are cheap AND fuel efficient AND environmentally friendly.
And now the car manufacturers have got caught cheating, so they're going to have to (I guess) face some penalty, and stop selling cars that cheat the tests.
People might want big, fast and safe cars, but they don't get to have them at the expense of the health and wellbeing of everyone else.
Bigger and faster is precisely the trend that should be reversed. While safely systems overall has improved, making faster cars makes them less safe. Cars should NOT be built like race cars. We can have separate race tracks for that.
No it doesn't. Driving a car faster is less safe, all other factors being equal, but simply making a faster car doesn't make it less safe. Look at Mercedes's performance cars, which typically lead the market in safety features. An example off the top of my head is the carbon cone built into the front of, I think, 2000-era SL500s. They could dissipate a tremendous amount of energy, making that fast car significantly safer than most other cars on the road at the time.
Aside from exotic safety features, performance cars tend to be better weight-balanced and tend to have better brakes and better tires than average cars. In normal driving, performance cars are safer because they'll be easier to control in emergency maneuvers.
(Of course when you push the limits of the car, all bets are off again.)
This isn't true for the SL500 at all, and I would venture to say not for performance cars in general. The SL500 is a pig at nearly 4,000lbs and has way too much torque and horsepower, and as a result, oversized parts which aren't made for normal driving. As the "performance" of the car ramps up, so does the difficulty of handling the car. A possible exception to this rule is AWD cars.
