Do we really know this? For decades various government agencies shielded many companies from liability, and continued to make public statements that leaded gas

Do we really know this? For decades various government agencies shielded many companies from liability, and continued to make public statements that leaded gas was "safe". in the 70s' public pressure, and outcry became large enough that companies started phasing out leaded gas as customers were demanded alternatives, it is at this point that government, working with industry developed the phase out plan that the public was demanded. This is often how regulations go, technology advances (in this case alternative anti-knock additives), public pressure builds, and at a critical junction industry allows (yes allows) government to "pass" regulation outlining something they were already going to do anyway based on public pressure. Now often the question is well if they were going to do it anyway why would they have government pass regulation. That is easy to answer because there is always some fear that some company will buck the trend, large companies hate competition but they can not coordinate on their own as that would be anti-trust violations, Thus government provides a nice avenue to ensure no competition on some matters or topics This is why facebook is currently asking the government for regulation. This is why Amazon supports a national sales tax, and why Walmart now supports increasing the minimum wage...