In your average space opera setting there's always a free-trader/smuggler/guy with a space ship stock character, but nobody ever asks where he got the spaceship or who he works for. Not in mine though. In my setting, there's economics and paperwork. There is a Guy With A Spaceship, but he also owns a business, you don't just go randomly going from planet to planet, you need to buy insurance first and such. Few people just own spaceships like cars or such, they are more like planes or... ships, and you need to make bank with them (unless you are some rich asshole and can buy them on a whim)
Anyways. Economics. There's no faster-than-light radio or communication. Communication is done by ultra-fast mail ships that carry data. Even so, they take weeks for getting from one side of the Galaxy to the other. Now that I think about it, life on a planet might seem fast compared to life in the spaceways... In any case, the only connection worlds have to the rest of the galaxy is visiting spaceships.
Most civilian spaceships are from these:
Big shipping corporations: These are the ones who have monopolized most of the big routes and the great lucrative contracts (like say, food for sprawling city worlds or transport of rare materials) Many are centuries old, others more recent (many times from state interventions that breaks them down in smaller companies) They are big, bad, and you are beneath their notice.
State shipping: Interstellar states, of course, own their own merchant marines (a bit like national airlines actually) for domestic purposes. There are socialist states where interestellar transport is completely controlled by worker's cooperatives: corporations are constantly trying to undermine them. Of course there's also state science, industrial, etc. interests, though some are contracted to corporations.
Relativist Clans: Before aetheric FTL travel was widespread, all interstellar travel was done by nomadic generation ships. In modern days, they have mostly settled in orbits (though some are still roaming around) and have spawned many smaller shipping companies and families that remain connected. They are in an interesting middle ground between company, nation, and institution. The so called "free-traders", ships that do work outside the main routes (like Our Heroes) mostly come from this background)
Belters: Space miners is the thing that most people think when they hear Belters, but in established systems, asteroids can be gardened palaces managing huge space factories. They usually don't care about interestellar affairs unless there's the promise of a mining rush in another star; in a way, that keeps the Belter exploring spirit alive. Many descend from relativist clans.
Mercenaries, bounty hunters, pirates, corsairs, guerrillas...: The idea of the single "elite" space-fighter facing against their enemies is an invention to sell holos. To maintain a single spaceship is a costly task; groups that kill for money (a profitable business, unfortunately, whatever the name) are often large by sheer logistics. Of course, what are dismissed as pirates or gangs might actually be well-organized revolutionary groups.
Starters: Named because they only remain around a single star, they are the ones who pilot the planet-to-orbit shuttles, maintain the spaceports, do in system mining and research, etc. They are space people too, though they don't travel across the galaxy like others, so a few assholes don't really consider them "astronauts".
Rich people who buy like, yatchs: there's plenty of these around.
There's actually a lot of other stuff you can find in space, I haven't even gotten into the space whales yet (of course there are space whales) but these are the main economic players so to speak.
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