Safety as priority

With the government making airbags mandatory even for the front passenger seat of new car models from 1 April (and of existing ones from 31 August). This comes less than two years after driver-seat airbags were made compulsory

1 min read . Updated: 07 Mar 2021, 10:22 PM IST Livemint

The state has good reason to intervene in markets where private choices are not always rational, and this is an example

For long, the primary focus of our automobile industry has been to keep costs low so that the vehicles are affordably priced. This has meant that safety hasn’t received as much attention as it deserves. Thankfully, this is changing now, with the government making airbags mandatory even for the front passenger seat of new car models from 1 April (and of existing ones from 31 August). This comes less than two years after driver-seat airbags were made compulsory.

This revision of basic standards is welcome. The base models of entry-level cars are often sold with bare-minimum safety equipment, and airbags are typically an add-on that one pays for, despite evidence that these can act as life-savers in the event of a crash. A human aversion to contemplating potentially-fatal outcomes, though, tends to warp people’s price-benefit calculations of such features. Just as accident insurance is best not left to customers as an option, nor should seat-belts and air cushions that inflate on impact. Low-end cars will turn a bit costlier, but that’s okay. The state has good reason to intervene in markets where private choices are not always rational, and this is an example.