Compare this to cars. Every year in the US there are about 6 million car crashes, 3 million injured people, and about 33,000 dead people (so, imagine a city like Dover, Delaware being wiped off the face of the earth every year).

The most typical causes are alcohol, speeding, and reckless driving. In addition, seat belts cut the risk of death by 45%. So, if we wanted to keep people safe the way we do for airlines, we would just attack these four problems.

There are many solutions, but the simplest ones would involve 1) a mandatory breathalyzer, 2) speed limiters, 3) sensors that shut down the car when reckless driving is detected, and 4) shutting down the car if seatbelts are not used. These all exist today, and would save tens of thousands of lives a year, and prevent millions of casualties, lawsuits, traffic jams, etc.

Why don't we do these things? My theory is the illusion of safety. In a car, you're wrapped inside 2 tons of steel and plastic, and you feel safe. Even if you know other people are dying inside, you feel like it won't happen to you. So we don't worry, so we don't care about changing things to save lives, because it'd be an inconvenience. But in an airplane, you're not in control; some pilot is. And you're hurtling along at at 500 miles per hour, 40,000 feet above the sky. That's scary. We better make sure those planes are safe.