Quote:
Originally Posted by bwilson4web
The quickest and best solution is a one-for-one swap of new VW, equivalent cars or a cash+inflation+25% payment for these cheat-diesels. Once VW has them, I don't care if they fix'em, salvage, or ship'em.
Bob Wilson
|
This is not a reasonable solution because the supposed harm was spread to everyone in a community that had one of the cheat-diesels; they were misrepresented to everyone, and not just those that purchased the vehicles.
The premise is that the environment was made worse than anticipated, which had negative impacts on the health of those in the community. Although it's impossible to quantify the additional harm done to people, some attempt could be made to estimate either the monetary value of the additional health problems, or quantify the additional amount of pollutants that were generated beyond what was represented. The money could then be spent to improve health outcomes for people, or spent on cleaner transportation such as funding public transit, or promoting EVs or other low polluting technologies. Perhaps offset the electricity generation of a coal plant by wind or solar.
The most direct victim in all this though is all of the other auto manufacturers that were playing by the rules. VW had a monopoly in the passenger diesel market for years, apparently because they were not playing by the rules. VW had an unfair market advantage that caused a loss of profit to everyone else.
My point is that nothing will make things right, and there are no solutions. If it were up to me, I would have VW make installment payments that improve health outcomes for people throughout the world, and not "fix" the cars they sold. Send those responsible for the SMOG defeat to prison.