>>Years ago, a driving instructor I knew sneered at automatic transmissions. I remember him saying, "You know the bumper cars at the exhibition? Those are automatics." Only he said it with a Russian accent.
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>The funny thing is they now get better gas mileage than manual transmission models.

It follows from the 90% of drivers knowing near zilch about clutch nowadays. Also, many of those manual ones are souped up sportsy cars, often bought by leadfoots (leadfeet?) who understand that a sport car on automatic is just like decaf. Understanding, however, doesn't necessarily mean skill. So the statistics are skewed.