Originally Posted by
NCommander
As for 1, I've heard this before, but no one has been able to cite me a source, for it; if you can, I'd be glad to accept this point.
While I don't have any sources, my personal feeling is that regardless of whether you *could* get better mileage driving a standard, that in the US at least, the vast majority of people driving them don't know how to drive them in a way that would get better mileage. I'm guessing most probably get worse just because they don't know how to drive them.