is the part of the industry that would see a significant improvement in safety
Take it away from just your opinion, quantify that. Subject it to a cost/benefit analysis. What is significant? Would you be able to measure anything? How much do you spend before it gets to measurable, let alone significant. In the big picture, is it really that dangerous out there, that often. These are legitimate questions. Does that "part of the industry" contribute enough funds to pay for the increased services they wish for. Maybe other sections of the industry don't want to pay for services they won't use, or are generally happy with the service they are getting for their type of ops.
Sometime we fly in almost complete silence .
So when you are not talking on the radio while flying, you are doing nothing else?
If that figure of 150 IFRs is correct, I'd wager that 80-90% of them are in 10% of the airspace. Maybe that means our ATC are doing a good job. Nobody has hit any one yet, and the pilots of them must be doing a pretty good job too, as none of them fly into each other or hills very often either.