Regulation

Seven worst car supposed safety features.

"First, the government countermanded the market’s verdict about air bags (most people didn’t want them enough to freely pay to have them). Then it ignored the warnings of car industry engineers, who told the government that air bags explode with great force and great forces exploding at close proximity to human faces might not be very “safe.” When it became impossible to cover up the mayhem being caused by exploding air bags, government mandated “smart” air bags. These adjust their explosive force based on input from sensors built into the car seats. In theory, the sensors sense whether a person is an adult or a child, wearing their seat belt or not – and so on. In fact, the sensors are so sensitive that they routinely mistake that foot-long hoagie you just bought and placed on the front passenger seat for an unbuckled child. This triggers the seatbelt buzzer (virtually all cars built since the early 2000s have these) which will not go off until you put your sandwich or laptop or backpack someplace else."

This is why the airbag company balks at a nationwide recall.