Be that as it may, I think the point still stands that safety is actually not the primary concern when it comes to how we decide what is acceptable on the roads.

As a society, we tacitly accept significant death and injury every year because making the changes to avoid said death and injury would render the roads unfit for actually transporting people at the speed and volume that society and the economy require.

There are other options, for example mass public transport that (as far as I'm aware) is much safer than road travel, but the US seems unable to to invest in it seriously for whatever reason.