In Europe you would be hard pressed to find a car without power steering or assisted brakes.

Still plenty to acquire around in second hand.

Not really.

Actually yes. Come to southern or eastern Europe, on plenty of those side road dealerships with signs on their windscreen, or parked in random places with a telephone number on them.

My 21 year old car in the uk has power steering, and it was low end when new

I'm in Central Europe and there aren't many manual transmissions around anymore where I am. But if you paint with a brush of two entire continents, you might paint a little too broadly.

I’m in Central Europe too and most cars are manuals. Must be just your neck of the woods. But I agree it’s a pointless debacle.

I think it's mostly the hybrids and EVs that are killing manual transmission. They were very common 20 years ago.

Unless you are driving an EV, or lucky to own Audi, Volvo, BMW or Mercedes top class of vehicle, most people are on manual.

In the UK, it's about 30% automatic on the road, but automatics have outsold manuals for years and about 80% of new cars sold today are automatic.

Doesn't compute with 30% on the road and 80% sales, also I doubt middle to low class cars are being sold with automatics.

Unless those 80% new cars are EVs.

Of course it does, half the cars on the road are over 10 years old, when manual outnumbered automatic