Properly adjusted headlights and people driving the appropriate following distance behind you should never have glaringly bright lights. Sadly neither is true very often. I’ve seen headlights out of whack straight from the factory. Headlights trend downward but people tailgating the shit out of you puts you in the beam path. Yes, height differences obviously play a role here.
I have a Miata, nearly anything on the road can blind me cause my head is only about ~3.5 feet(~1m) off the ground. The entire car is only about 4 feet(~1.2m) tall.
To anybody that lifted their vehicle truck or otherwise…did the thought of adjusting your headlights even cross your mind? I’m guessing not.
I’m also going to toss this out there…for the love of God do not put led bulbs in halogen light fixtures. I don’t care if they say they ‘mimic’ the halogen beam pattern…they don’t. You’re blinding everyone on the damn road just stop please, I beg you. (This is going to be the controversial piece that people respond to….yes, I know of a few bulbs that do okay at this but they’re expensive. People are buying the $20 ones on Amazon, and they suck at it. So my blanket statement is just don’t…please just don’t).
Not entirely disagreeing with you. The way you worded it was always going to be the case if all you do is compare window sticker prices from across the decades though. Inflation cuts your money in half roughly every 20 years. A 20K car in 2006 is a ~40k car today even if everything else stayed equal. The average price for cars after inflation is going up though. The US’s trend towards SUVs and trucks is certainly pulling prices up but other things do as well like the government mandated features(small relatively but not nothing).
Some examples(these are when they became mandatory, not available)