New cars are more expensive than ever, with the average price of one sitting above $50,000. More often than not, safety tech is blamed for it. A recent piece from the Insurance Institute for Highway Safety (IIHS) makes a strong case that this narrative misses the mark. Modern crash protection and driver assistance systems are not the main reason prices have spiralled. In fact, some of the safest cars on the road remain among the most affordable. The real issue is what gets prioritised when affordability becomes a talking point.
Our Buying Habits Are Driving Up Prices
Mercedes-Benz
Nowadays, cheap cars have more standard safety tech than ever before. According to the IIHS, there are numerous new cars under $30,000 that deliver excellent crash protection and standard driver assistance, highlighting the 2026 Mazda 3 in particular. What drives prices higher is everything layered on top.
Bigger vehicles, higher trim levels, and luxury features quickly add thousands without improving real-world safety. Take, for instance, the 2026 Mercedes-Benz E-Class. Despite being a full-size luxury sedan with a starting MSRP of $66,400, it earned a surprisingly weak safety score. At the other end of the spectrum, the much smaller and cheaper 2026 Mercedes-Benz CLA achieved the highest Euro NCAP safety rating last year. With Euro NCAP set to revise testing protocols in 2026, that gap between perception and reality may widen even further in the future.
Cutting Safety Would Backfire Financially
Lucid
Downsizing on how much required safety tech a car needs needs to have will bring down production costs, resulting in lower selling prices. But there’s more than meets the eye. In fact, it would shift costs rather than remove them. Fewer safety systems will translate to more severe crashes, higher injury rates, and more insurance claims. Inevitably, drivers will face higher insurance premiums and even more expensive medical bills.
But that’s not all. If new car prices were to continue to climb, like they are now, Americans would want to hold onto older vehicles longer. Sure, it might make financial sense, but a decade-old Toyota Camry lacks modern driver assistance tech and, more importantly, years of structural safety improvements. This also explains why some automakers are going back to basics. On top of Ford‘s upcoming $30,000 electric pickup, the brand wants to revive affordable sedans as an alternative to larger, more expensive vehicles. And as we’ve seen, size doesn’t always matter when it comes down to safety.
Affordability and Safety Co-Existing
Nowhere in the autosphere does the balance between safety and affordability get messier than at Tesla. Despite a long-standing reputation for safety, the brand has faced numerous wrongful death cases relating to failing hardware, and has recently decided to lock Full Self-Driving behind a subscription paywall, making it even more expensive to acquire modern-day safety tech.
If affordability truly matters, safety should not be the first thing sacrificed, nor should it be exploited for greater profit margins. The real challenge is separating meaningful protection from costly excess and recognising that expensive does not always mean safer.
