Based on a recent article in The Wall Street Journal, side impact crashes are among the deadliest, accounting for nearly 10,000 deaths every year. Child safety concerns have kept auto manufacturers from making side-impact airbags standard equipment, though they are optional on most middle- to highermarket automobiles. Openly critical comments by General Motors's Ron Zarrella that other manufacturers' airbag systems inflate too powerfully and present a potential hazard to children have led to an industry wide study aimed at devising a common set of safety standards for side-impact airbag systems. Part of the trick of developing a set of standards that will protect both adults and children equally is getting the industry to agree on a single set of standards.

Suppose that such standards are developed and that Ford and GM must simultaneously decide whether to make side-impact airbags standard equipment on all models. Sideimpact airbags raise the price of each automobile by $500. If both Ford and GM make side-impact airbags standard equipment, each company will earn profits of $1.5 billion. If neither company adopts the sideimpact airbag technology, each company will earn $0.5 billion (due to lost sales to other automakers). If one company adopts the technology as standard equipment and the other does not, the adopting company will earn a profit of $2 billion and the other company will lose $1 billion.

If you were a decision maker at GM, would you make side-impact airbags standard equipment? Explain