How many jobs in the U.S. can you think of where the death rate from homicide alone has been nearly 2%/person/year (nearly 10%/person, with an average job tenure of 5 years)?
I suppose there might be some specialized high-risk military categories during wartime that fit this profile, as well as perhaps some high-risk civilian job categories in the pharmaceutical distribution and urban social club sector. But focusing on legal civilian occupations, I doubt that there are any — other than the President of the United States, of course. As my friend Raquelle de la Rocha pointed out, imagine what this must do to his worker’s comp premiums.
UPDATE: Some people dismiss the historical examples on the grounds that they were before modern Secret Service protection, and that these days the risk of assassination is much less. Of course, Secret Service protection may well make a difference, and it’s impossible to predict such risks with any accuracy. But given that Presidents Ford and Reagan avoided being killed largely by chance — even though, as best I can tell, they had a roughly comparable degree of Secret Service protection to what is available now — I suspect that assassination will continue to be a serious threat to Presidents, at least unless they drastically cut back on their public appearances (which would be unfortunate, and right now seems unlikely).
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