CAFE Standards is why most of us can’t afford a real car.
Your larger point (which is absolutely correct) is that the cost of all these federal regulations and compliance costs put new cars out of the reach of far too many.
It's not just the CAFE standards. We can go all the way back to catalytic converters becoming mandatory along with 5mph bumpers (anyone remember those?!) as the point where the FedGov massively intervened to drive the cost of a product up exponentially, regulating the piss out of it and making it so the average joe can't buy a new car anymore.