Richard Rider’s Comments

• Nov 30th, 2014 @ 8:06pm

  Police work not NEARLY as dangerous as most think

  on Number Of Officers Killed In The Line Of Duty Drops To 50-Year Low While Number Of Citizens Killed By Cops Remains Unchanged
  What's fascinating about these statistics is the recent TREND. The number of police fatalities nationwide have dropped DRAMATICALLY in the last couple of years. Police mortality is the lowest it's been in over 50 years. And police officers killed by guns dropped 33% just last year!
  
  https://www.techdirt.com/articles/20131230/15411225716/number-officers-killed-line-duty-drops-t o-50-year-low-while-number-citizens-killed-cops-remains-unchanged.shtml
  
  Moreover, California has a particularly low cop death rate -- our CA five year average is 4.4 per 100,000 cops per year -- compared with the national average for ALL occupations in 2013 of 3.2 deaths per 100,000 per year.
  http://www.governing.com/blogs/by-the-numbers/police-law-enforcement-safety-death-rates-by-stat e.html
  
  There are many occupations more dangerous than police work. Any robust outdoor work is likely more fatal than what cops face. That includes truck drivers, construction laborers, extraction industries, farming, ranching, coaching(!) and a number of other jobs.
  
  Here's an article I wrote in this in January, 2014:
  http://riderrants.blogspot.com/2014/01/mortality-risk-for-police-and.html
  
  Included is a list of more dangerous occupations with the numbers.
  
  BTW, given our considerably better than average police (and firefighter) mortality rate in California, I puzzle over this anomaly:
  
  The average California firefighter is paid 60% more than paid firefighters in other 49 states. CA cops paid 56% more.
  http://tinyurl.com/CA-ff-and-cop-pay