That's like saying Congress can reform our liability laws and turn it into more of a Japanese system.

Well, OK, sure, it's a possibility, but the reason why that wont happen is because we as a nation are much more litigious and expect to have a right to sue. We love to blame big business and make them pay.

People have been clamoring for reform of medical liability for decades - still no progress on that front, either.

Safe harbours are not politically popular here, and you tend to get them only in very niche areas that are below the radar of most people. Auto accidents and traffic injury law, not so much.

The US is like one of the most pro-company countries I can imagine. The amount of lobbying to only benefit Big Co is ridiculous from a European point of view - I don’t see it as a negative to even increase the liability of companies. They should very well be responsible for everything they do, and it should not cost/risk innocent lives to further a private companies profits without public benefit!

Several US states have actually imposed caps on medical malpractice damages.

Do you know how many lawyers are in Congress or donate to politicians? Trial lawyers as a group are big donors to the Democratic Party. There is no way, Congress is going to do anything to make it harder for lawyers to sue people.

Probably true but I’d think Google, GM and every other company working on this tech that is probably going to be a 100B+ industry would have at least some influence here.

Haven't there are already been self-driving car accidents that killed people? And also - is the US behind in the self-driving race?

Fewer than cars by people and no.

Rocket launchers kill much less people than guns, but I doubt it is a reasonable assumption that the former is less dangerous/deadly..