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I won't pretend to be an expert on the auto market here in NZ (yet), but it seems to me that, once imports of vehicles (newer than a certain date) that did not have traction control were banned, all new vehicles sold past that point had traction control.
If the aim was to have traction control on all vehicles, it worked.
When I looked at the difference in registration costs between motorcycles / diesels / gasoline cars, I pretty much ruled out the first two. The motorcycle registration cost is apparently pegged to the relative increase in cost to the public healthcare system. I can only assume the same is true for diesels due to emissions differences.
As for fuel economy, the price of fuel largely seems to take care of that. If the US really wanted to improve fleet fuel economy, it could try removing some of the subsidies that keep fossil fuels artificially cheap. It's amazing how quickly people dump their guzzlers when fuel prices jump by $1.00.
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