In 1964 and 1966, public pressure grew in the United States to increase the safety of cars, culminating with the publishing of Unsafe at Any Speed, by Ralph Nader, an activist lawyer, and the report prepared by the National Academy of Sciences entitled Accidental Death and Disability: The Neglected Disease of Modern Society.

In 1966, Congress held a series of publicized hearings regarding highway safety, passed legislation to make the installation of seat belts mandatory, and created the U.S. Department of Transportation on October 15, 1966 (Pub.

Legislation signed by President Lyndon Johnson earlier on September 9, 1966, included the National Traffic and Motor Vehicle Safety Act (Pub.

Despite improvements in vehicle design and public awareness of issues like drunk driving, traffic fatalities have remained stubbornly high.

[9] Audits by the U.S. Department of Transportation's Office of the Inspector General in 2011, 2014, 2015, 2016, 2018, and 2021 have concluded that NHTSA is ineffectual;[further explanation needed] the 2021 audit found NHTSA failing to issue or update Federal Motor Vehicle Safety Standards effectively or to act within timeframes on petitions and investigations; having no process in place for critical agency responsibilities like evaluating petitions, and having failed to implement consensus recommendations derived from the Inspector General's audit a decade before, in 2011.

[12] The 2015 audit found NHTSA's collection and analysis of safety-related data to be inadequate,[13] and the agency to be lackadaisical and careless in examining safety defects.

[14] Government data (from FARS for the U.S.) in a 2004 book by former General Motors safety researcher Leonard Evans[15] shows other countries achieving greater traffic safety improvements over time than those achieved in the United States:[needs update] Research suggests one reason the U.S. continues to lag in traffic safety is the relatively high prevalence in the U.S. of pickup trucks and SUVs, which a 2003 study by the U.S. Transportation Research Board found are significantly less safe than passenger cars.

[19] In January 2025, NHTSA opened a preliminary investigation into 877,710 General Motors trucks and SUVs (model years 2019–2024) after receiving 39 complaints and reports of engine failures caused by bearing issues.

While many countries adopted or required adherence to the UN Regulations,[21] the United States did not recognize these standards and restricted the importation of vehicles and components not certified by manufacturers as compliant with U.S.

[28][better source needed] The ongoing ban on newer vehicles considered safe in countries with lower vehicle-related death rates has created a perception that an effect of NHTSA's regulatory activity is to protect the U.S. market for a modified oligopoly consisting of the three U.S.-based automakers and the American operations of foreign-brand producers.

It has been suggested[29] that the impetus for NHTSA's seeming preoccupation with market control rather than vehicular safety performance is a result of overt market protections such as tariffs and local-content laws having become politically unpopular due to the increasing popularity of free trade, thus driving the industry to adopt less visible forms of trade restrictions in the form of technical regulations different from those outside the United States.

[30] An example of the market-control effects of NHTSA's regulatory protocol is found in the agency's 1974 banning of the Citroën SM automobile, which contemporary journalists[who?]

For example, FMVSS #208 effectively mandates the installation of frontal airbags in all new vehicles in the United States, for it is written such that no other technology can meet the stipulated requirements.

[37][38] Cost–benefit requirements have been used as the basis for lighting-related regulation in the U.S; for example, while many countries in the world since at least the early 1970s have required rear turn signals to emit amber light so they might be distinguished from adjacent red brake lamps, U.S. regulations permit rear turn signals to emit either amber or red light.

This has historically been justified on grounds of lower manufacturing cost[39] and greater automaker styling freedom in the context of no demonstrated safety benefit to amber over red.

To improve the dissemination of NCAP ratings, and as a result of the Safe, Accountable, Flexible, Efficient Transportation Equity Act: A Legacy for Users (SAFETEA–LU), the agency has issued a Final Rule requiring manufacturers to place NCAP star ratings on the Monroney sticker (automobile price sticker).

[46] This article incorporates public domain material from websites or documents of the United States Department of Transportation.