A lady I used to work with in the 80's drove an ancient beast of station wagon. She had gotten the car and custody of four kids in a divorce settlement. While helping her with some parking lot repairs one night after work (changing the thermostat, if I remember correctly) I asked her why she didn't get something newer. She said that the amount she could get on a trade-in wasn't enough for her to afford a new car big enough for her family.
The State ARB eventually solved her problem. First they rented her car from her, allegedly to measure its emissions in a controlled set of driving tests, and loaned her a newer car of similar size while they were doing it. Eventually they offered her a big sum of money for it which allowed her to get the newer cleaner car she really wanted. The ARB sent the old one to the crusher. That was a direct and financially efficient way of reducing air pollution at the source.
When I first moved to California in 1970, I bought a used 1960 VW Beetle. There were no emissions controls of any kind other than the fact that it had better than average fuel efficiency compared to cars of that time (20/24 MPG city/highway). Later that year I bought a new 1971 VW Beetle with my re-enlistment bonus money. It had all kinds of improvements - a sealed gas tank, a PCV valve, and a simple mechanical device that reduced hydrocarbon emissions when idling and accelerating,. There was no biennial smog test required then, but the CHP randomly set up roadside test points where they would inspect that the emissions control devices had not been removed or altered and would measure the tailpipe emissions. A new law allowed any police officer to issue a ticket to the driver of a vehicle with visible smoke coming from the tailpipe - the "Cheapy Smoker Law" a policeman friend of me called it.
Now you can't buy a gasoline-powered personal car that doesn't have a catalytic converter and an engine computer that has as part of its program reduction in emissions.
Where have you been living over that time?