Quote:
Originally Posted by drob23
I would argue that IIHS and NHTSA have stricter safety regulations. The IIHS is funded by insurance companies, which in modern market driven economies is more efficient in imposing change than governing bodies like the EU that like to b*tch amongst themselves. There's obvious reasons why insurance companies want safer vehicles. It's interesting how NA spec cars tend to be heavier than EU, roughly 200 lbs for the F30 as an example. I do know that EU has more strict emissions requirements baked into taxes.
This new proposed NA/EU free trade act will probably streamline this, especially given that many OEM's (and the larger auto-groups) have been forced to develop global platforms.
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For starters, IIHS is not a governing body for the industry. Only NHTSA is. IIHS is a lobbying group.
The EU has a different set of criteria with respect to crashworthiness than the US. One of the primary differences that comes to mind is roof strength and rollover survival. Since the roof must be sufficiently strong to withstand a rollover the A, B and C pillars must be stronger by default. The US does not enforce roof strength to the levels that the EU does.
While NHTSA definitely has regs that differ from the EU, a great number of the differences are related to lighting, reflectors, indicator colors and the like. They don't necessarily increase the crash worthiness of the vehicle.