Of course, PAYPAL is safe, what's not safe is innocent/dumb victims who fall prey to those scammers.
This is how they work,
 1. They send you a payment to your paypal either through stolen paypal account or of those whose a/c got phished to their scheme. Or  
     they want you to click on the link to confirm the payment(PHISHING!!!)
 2. You'll see the pending status of received payment on your paypal and you'd think it's legit. (Behind your back, they now have access to 
     your paypal account if you happened to click one of the links they've  sent).
 3. Someone wil deliberately call you using fakes names, so-called agents come and pick up your vehicle.
 4. They probably de-assemble your vehicle into parts and sell it.
 5. Few hours, later you'll see there is no pending status on your paypal account because the real owner of the account reported or 
     something like that.
 6. Or if it's their own a/c, they'll create the dispute and may say they never received the vehicle and such.
 7. Eitherway, your f**k'd up big time, someone stole your car right under your nose.

I like to mess with these scammers, I play by their rules and many of these are such smartass rascals, they concede even before the game begins. They figure out somehow that I'm with Law Enforcement or something like that.

Paypal is definitely safe, just beware of these digital-age criminals/thieves out there.