The law requires bad design/implementation?

Yes, pretty much.

They could try to cheat! That's actually what Volvo did in the Dieselgate. The EU regulation mandated the impossible duo of lower NOx emission and higher fuel efficiency. Diesel engines get higher efficiency by increasing compression ratio, which also increases NOx production.

So they should innovate then, spend those millions into some real R&D. Or does innovation only come in form of touch screen panels?

I’m pretty dure you mean Volkswagen, not Volvo…

They can lobby the politicians

They do. They know this will make cars more expensive and most people don't want any of it.

If a substantial portion of people refused to keep buying them, that's data supporting the repeal.

If people just keep buying them, then the lawmakers get to go "no see the people like it".

Why would they on such things?

In any case, it's law, there's no coming back from this.

Laws are immutable now?

possibilities: (1) they get lots of angry customers and bad press, and are tired of being made to look bad because of gov req's (2) it costs them more to manufacture all the fancy nanny tech, so their bottom line would be positively impacted by rolling back the requirement for it

> Why would they on such things?

Read the context of what you are replying to.