I heard a VW owner interviewed on the radio today saying if VW offers to buy her car back, they must pay her the full amount she paid them, the new car price. VW will probably say "Hey, we'll buy it back if you want, but we aren't paying you new price for a used car."
Yeah, that is a totally unrealistic expectation. I don’t believe any court in the land would support that position either. No one was deprived use of the vehicle. The only “damage” to the owner is in the amount of residual value (compared to a car without the stigma/issue affecting its resale value). You’re entitled to this difference making you whole not to gain an advantage by being put into a brand new car.
Usually you would think it would be the price paid maybe, minus so much per mile for usage, like 25 cents or so. I suppose some might want to be compensated for the shaming of the whole thing.
I have had a few friends who leased high end cars that turned out to be lemons. They were compensated for some of the payments, inconvenience and were relieved from the rest of the lease.
We were collectively harmed by their actions. Therefore any punitive damages (beyond making car owners whole) will be awarded to the government (as representatives of the collective harm to everyone) and IMO should be applied to the cause they were responsible for willfully violating- some type of environmental cleanup issue for example. However, if history is any judge it is more likely to go into the general bucket as some kind of windfall to be disbursed to various other unrelated pet programs…