You're right; when I say "not that risky" I'm comparing reality vs. perception of space flight more than reality of space flight vs. reality of dangerous civili

You're right; when I say "not that risky" I'm comparing reality vs. perception of space flight more than reality of space flight vs. reality of dangerous civilian jobs. On the other hand, for an accurate comparison to BLS numbers I think we would need the total number of astronauts, not the number of spaceflight participants. As for safety improvements, 3 of the 4 fatal spaceflight accidents (and 11 of 18 deaths) occurred in relatively new vehicles. Only one of the accidents occurred in a tried-and-true vehicle, and the fatality count is inflated by the number of people NASA put on each shuttle.