Pilot surprised me as well. Thank you for the link. Here is the pilot section:

2. Commercial pilots

This does not include pilots of passenger planes for major airlines like you might use to travel for work or vacation. These folks navigate planes or helicopters to carry cargo and, in less common and less hazardous roles, lead air tours or navigate air ambulances. Nearly all deaths and injuries were caused by catastrophic crashes, which is why the nonfatal injury rate for the profession ranked low, at 297th.

Just because something is outside of your personal knowledge or experience doesn’t mean it’s wrong.

just because you saw cool picture on the internet does not mean you have personal knowledge. i actually do have some knowledge, which is why i reacted.

in 2025, there were 300056 (three hundred thousand) pilots with either cpl or atpl - these are pilots legally allowed to accept reward for piloting a plane.

• https://www.faa.gov/data_research/aviation_data_statistics/civil_airmen_statistics/2025_Active_Civil_Airmen_Statistics_FINAL.xlsx

so it would seem that the tabloid story in usa today drawing some conclusion out of 37k "workers" - roughly 8 times smaller number, has very loose connection to reality.