God bless my state of Michigan: zero inspections, no front license plates. I’ve lived in states with the opposite and it’s oppressive (as an automotive enthusiast)
There is a balance. I’ve lived all over the US and I appreciate the fact that MI is less user hostile than other states in this regard. We still have regulations. California and Virginia are oppressive.
Meanwhile I've seen people crash their cars every single week during my stay in the US because they drove on tires they should have replaced literal years earlier.
In SV as soon as it rain google maps becomes a Christmas tree because there are hundreds of red icons signalling accident, 10%+ of cars over there have diy slick tires
If any Europeans or Asians are wondering "why are America's vehicle standards so lax", here's your answer. There are a LOT of people that think the way this poster does.
And entirely corrupt and inconsistent. I know people who get the inspections stickers withheld so the shop can try to talk you into paying for maintenance or given out for free to friends.
In my state, shops have a strict 3 strikes policy for ANY inspection related infraction, including charging less than $12.50 (presumably to prevent shops from cutting corners to undercut the competition) and giving out stickers to failed vehicles. This can result in shops with two strikes being EXTREMELY conservative in their recommendations to not lose their license. I don't think that's a bad thing, because you have to be EXTREMELY sketchy to get those strikes in the first place. Many shops will give out stickers to people with mostly safe but maybe has a simple item kind of failing, but that likely depends on how "visible" the issue is because they have to sign their name on every single sticker.
It works really really well. I've been very buddy buddy with shops and they will still give me a thorough inspection. It's also a pretty basic inspection, meaning if you fail it you should probably not be on the road.
Yep - I have a mechanic I trust - he doesn't do inspections, asked him to check my tires before I brought it in to get inspected and he said they should pass - unless the place I bring it for the inspection, also sells tires.
Its mind boggling to me that the place the does the inspections, is also the same place that can sell you the repairs - repairs that you may or may not actually need.
Shops that also run small time (usually BHPH) dealerships or get a lot of income from tire sales are the worst about it due to the obvious conflict of interests.
In my state the emissions and safety inspections are combined under the same license. As recently as the 2010s the 3rd party that the training was contracted out to would straight up tell you in the PowerPoint slides that the state's #1 priority is emissions and that the point of the safety inspection was to make holding the license lucrative to remove incentive to circumvent emissions inspection process. At least they're honest...<sigh>
It was baffling to me when I was in Florida and rented a car. I was driving on the highways and no matter where I was, every highway was littered with abandoned cars. I had things fly off from a car into mine (splash shield). And then I realized its most likely because Florida has no safety inspections.
As a car enthusiast myself, I'm glad Mass has safety regulations and I don't have to jeopardize my safety or breathe pollution from cars rolling coal. Safety and car hobbies can go hand in hand.
GM and Ford have been trying to shed their dealer networks for the better part of a century, but even in Michigan, dealerships have more lobbying power than they do.
They're obviously not going to stand for Tesla doing what they're banned from doing. Even if they'd rather be doing it themselves.
