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Largest Auto-Scandal Settlement In US History: Judge Approves $15 Billion Volkswagen Settlement (usatoday.com)
A federal just has approved the largest auto-scandal settlement in U.S. history, a $14.7 billion settlement concerning Volkswagen Group's diesel car emissions scandal. USA Today reports: U.S. District Court Judge Charles Breyer in San Francisco approved the sweeping agreement between consumers, the government, California regulators and the German automaker in a written ruling a week after signaling he was likely to sign off. He said the agreement is "fair, reasonable and adequate." The settlement comes about a year after Volkswagen admitted that it rigged 11 million vehicles worldwide with software designed to dodge emissions standards. The company is still facing criminal investigations by the U.S. Justice Department and German prosecutors. The U.S. probe could lead to additional financial penalties and criminal indictments. About 475,000 Volkswagen owners in the U.S. can choose between a buyback or a free fix and compensation, if a repair becomes available. VW will begin administering the settlement immediately, having already devoted several hundred employees to handling the process. Buybacks range in value from $12,475 to $44,176, including restitution payments, and varying based on milage. People who opt for a fix approved by the Environmental Protection Agency will receive payouts ranging from $5,100 to $9,852, depending on the book value of their car. Volkswagen will also pay $2.7 billion for environmental mitigation and another $2 billion for clean-emissions infrastructure.
I'm genuinely surprised this story has been on the front page this long: a) without a comment, and b) without a comment from someone making a snarky remark about global warming being fake and how its killing businesses. Good on you Slashdot.
just pwnt
Do they get destroyed or re-sold? If they're re-sold, how cheap will they be?
"[Regarding the 'cloud,'] ownership was what made America different than Russia." -- Woz
Why would anyone want the fix? Does it just give real emissions ratings? If you like the car wouldn't you be better off skipping the fix and passing emissions tests?
Probably would have been cheaper to close the company and buy out Tesla.
Oh well...now we can move on to Ford, GM, Toyota, etc. probably doing the same thing.
I own a 2014 model... Less than 40k miles. Basically, I can turn my car in, and walk away with $30. According to them anyway... No restitution for sales tax and fee's paid when I bought it, no restitution for my lost time and the anguish of having to go to a car dealership and buy something else. Hell, I'm not sure they're even going to cover the sales tax to turn it in. I've moved states since buying it, and I think this state will want to collect taxes on the buyback...
your company out of business!
Just for that we're going to try to FINE your company out of business!
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Right now all I see are government bribes, rich lawyers, and a lot of little people getting compensated for cars that run well enough to get them to and from work every day.
If anyone under the C-Level Exec suite goes to jail, you know it was a setup.
Pursuant to the clean air act and 18 U.S.C. 3571, the penalty is either twice the revenue earned on TDIs that contained the defeat device or $10k-$500k per offense, i.e. violating car sold. This probably works out to around $100k per violating car sold. I hear there are about half a million violating cars sold.
$100,000 x 500,000 = $50,000,000,000. $50B. Market cap is over $65B. Rule of law prevails and company still worth $15B. Everybody happy.
$15,000,000,000.
Really. Were peoples lives so ruined that they need to return the cars and get payouts. I fail to see how emotional hard is caused by finding out your vehicle is not a eco-friendly as you had been told.
First world problems.
Headline claims "$15 Billion Volkswagen Settlement" while the opening sentence says "A federal just has approved the largest auto-scandal settlement in U.S. history, a $14.7 billion settlement"
They are off by 300 million dollars.
How can we trust anything this writer claims?
Of course sw can fix it.
Oh, you mean FIX it.
Yeah, that too.
Please sign here. Beech.
To me this VW emissions scandal, and many others, kind of shows just how difficult if not impossible it is to set standards that apply at all time under all conditions in the real world. The only way to monitor emissions in real-world conditions is to monitor them in real time as we drive. Every car across the planet, and then relay that information to some central location. And then what I think you'll find is that most engines don't meet the strictest standards a lot of the time. And it will vary as much on people's driving habits as anything. Punch it off the light and you're going to emit a lot more particulates than cruising. Drive it hard while cold and you'll pollute regardless. And even gasoline engines likely emit much more particulate pollution than we thought before, especially with direct injection.
That's not to say pollution standards aren't good. A car that meets standards under controlled conditions is going to be a lot cleaner under any circumstances than an engine that didn't meet those standards under controlled circumstances.
Firing up diesel-powered microwave oven. Inserting popcorn.
Fry the krauts. Fry them. Ooh, I hope this crashes Germany's economy and torpedoes the EU. Ooh, the glee when Europe is abolished.
Squirm, Fritz, Squirm!!!! HAAAHAHHHAHA
Who gets all this free money? I will probably be collected over years, but what does it go for to reduce the deficit? Why not give it to the people to help spur the economy, or use it to find the Mars missions or something positive, instead of some layers pockets.
GM covering up and failing to recall vehicles for a known ignition switch issue that led directly to the deaths of 13 people:
$35 million
Volkswagen fiddling their emissions tests:
$14.7 billion
Hmmm......
So the environment and consumers are frauded upon at very large scale by a corporation and nobody responsible goes to jail ?
The fine is huge but I would expect the people that committed the fraud would get jail time at least.
This is nothing but the U.S. launching at a chance of getting $19B into the economy while at the same time hurting a major competitor in their own market, favoring U.S. manufacturers. There is no way the emission cheating amounted to even a single billion in costs. This is even more disgusting than the emission cheating itself.
That's pretty great that they will pay compensation to US residents. I wonder if there will be any fines in Europe, given that we (our politicians) are all Germany's bitches over here.