>The original statement implied that profits always trump safety.
While that may be how you interpreted it, that isn't what he stated.
Death rates of various causes have been decreasing primarily due to technological and medical advancements, not because people are more conscious of others safety or less focused on profits. Companies time and time again still choose the cheaper options over peoples safety. If you need evidence look at the oil/gas industry, the pharmaceutical industry, politicians, companies that manufacture products over seas for pennies on the dollar while employees kill themselves from stress, and countless others.
You can even further apply this to tech companies such as Facebook, because while they may not be directly causing peoples deaths, they are having a major negative impact on society and constantly make declensions to maximize profits rather than look out for user safety and well being
It's certainly easy to find examples of profit trumping safety, if that's what you're after.
But GP is correct that the overall balance is much more towards safety today than (say) 100 years ago. It's not really technological advances that sets how many people die to build a skyscraper (and medicine is equally helpless now as then). How many people die in factory fires etc. isn't about the owners being more or less greedy now, it's about whether the fire safety inspector has teeth, which is a political choice.
And in a way a rational choice, too. Every such choice amounts in some way to putting a value on a life, and now that we are much wealthier, this implicit value is much higher.
While that may be how you interpreted it, that isn't what he stated.
Death rates of various causes have been decreasing primarily due to technological and medical advancements, not because people are more conscious of others safety or less focused on profits. Companies time and time again still choose the cheaper options over peoples safety. If you need evidence look at the oil/gas industry, the pharmaceutical industry, politicians, companies that manufacture products over seas for pennies on the dollar while employees kill themselves from stress, and countless others.
You can even further apply this to tech companies such as Facebook, because while they may not be directly causing peoples deaths, they are having a major negative impact on society and constantly make declensions to maximize profits rather than look out for user safety and well being