Looking at the data, the steady decline in deaths per passageway mile suggests improving safety actually works. Now, it may be useful to make people feel less safe, but IMO most accidents are caused by people not really paying attention and automated systems which tell them something bad happens should help as long as they alert the driver that something bad almost happened.

PS: The fact you can take little damage while rear ending someone at 65MPH is not something the average person wants to test out.