In reality most Americans cannot afford snow tires- the ones that do tend to be upper middle class skiing folk, in my experience.
Allow me to add the obvious implication
>anyone who can afford what I consider to be the minimum car worth buying should be able to afford one
Plenty of people drive cheap junk they bought with their tax return and pay insurance month to month. Those people deserve to get to work and the grocery store without having to violate any laws. The damage to our society from not requiring people to use snow tires is far less than the damage to our society that would be done by a huge chunk of people in violation of a law for a good chunk of the year.
Laws are how we quickly and easily categorize what a society finds acceptable and unacceptable.
Laws are not how you determine what is and isn't acceptable.
Our society does not require snow tires for part of the year. If this is so abhorrent then write whatever elected official represents you or move to northern Europe.