have you ever thought about what kind of cars you would have had

Yes, actually I have had three outstanding economy cars in amongst the muscle.

 Plymouth Champ '80 46 mpg

Toyota Echo '03  44 mpg

Scion XB  '06 39 mpg

None of the three could get out of their own way but they were exceedingly practical.

Never once in my driving life since I got my license back in 1967, have I ever owned a car that I paid attention to what the gas mileage I could get was.  Back in my working days I drove anywhere from 250 to 350 miles to work and then whatever the additional regular every day miles amounted to, and NEVER did I pay attention to what my gas mileage was.  NEVER! 

When I need gas, I fill up.  And if it happened that it was more than once a week or whatever time frame, I've never paid attention to the miles per gallon my car got. 

My only concern to me with any car that I've ever owned is that I like the car and that it's comfortable for me.  That's all that's ever mattered. 

And with no disrespect to anyone here or anywhere else intended or insinuated, I've wondered many times why people will purchase some little Go-Cart and cram themselves and their families in to them, because of the price of gasoline. 

In my world and to my thinking, gas is a "must have" commodity and as such, it's never been something that I've complained about and then downsize to a car that is not fun to be in and drive.  

I me mine my I.  My 20's - 50's I never cared about mpg for few reasons: 1. I was working and could make more money if I needed it  2. gas was cheap.  3. I was young & foolish.  In retirement and during a gas crisis I thought about MPG since I do drive a lot, with limited funds.

Driving a '72 Plymouth Sports Suburban

and in one 24 hour period in 1979 I put 3 tanks of gas in it.  I figured out if I could buy a new car for less than $ 3,000 and it got better than 35 mpg it would pay for it self in 3 years in gas savings alone.  So rather than working on my gas guzzler [comfortable] for the endless minor problems [oil pressure sending unit, thermostat, always something though always minor but a constant pain], I want a new car but at the time could not afford one.  Hence 1980 Champ,

the only car that coat me $ 2,700 and averaged 40 mpg plus and I actually fit in it comfortably.  I liked it so much I bought my wife a Dodge Colt

[same as the Plymouth Champ or the Mitsubishi Mirage] but she could do no better than 37 mpg [mostly local driving]. After 3 years my Champ had 92,000 miles on it so I sold it for $1900 plus a check from a woman's insurance for destroying the right front fender [still quite driveable] so I paid $2700, drove it 92000 miles in 3 years and got $2500 back [1900+600]. Took my wife's Colt which was 3.5 years old with 3???? miles and I got an average of 40 plus mpg. Actually I bought my self an 83 Plymouth Reliant first

2 door, biggest lemon I ever owned, so after 6 months I let the wife have the new car [not bad in city driving] while arguing with the dealer & Chrysler with the states new lemon law, another story.

Did the best I could with the money I had, which required me to check mpg. Yup, '67 to '70 I bought new muscle cars of my choice, but '71 - '85 family & home came first.

@brush 

Thanks for sharing your story.  You're a good man!  

A thought with regard to those that say gas was once cheap.  Yes, it cost much less than it does today, but everyone seems to forget that incomes were also much less back in those perceived lower gas price days.  With inflation and incomes taken in to account, gas costs today, the same as it did back then.  

Filled’em  up and never looked back….13mpg period !

Back in the mid '50's gas was .20 per gallon and my trade was paid $ 3.09;  in the mid '60's gas was $ .30 and my pay scale was $ 5.85 per hour; today gas is $ 3.90 and my pay scale would be $ 51 per hour.  

I guess the catch would be instead of 3 tanks of gas in the Banana Boat compared to one in the Champ, even if gas is relatively the same price I would have had to buy 3 times as much. $10 compared to $30, worth checking mpg.

Yes, I average 34 mpg with lots of short city trips, but with more room inside than out. I love my Honda Fit.

My father drove Ramblers and I got the econo-bug from him.