Problem is your assuming revolvers are more reliable than autos and thats simply not the case anymore.
Problem is, anybody who's fired a significant number of rounds through both systems knows that just ain't so, Pat. You know that as well as I do. Yes, revolvers can and do malf, too, and autos are terrifically reliable these days, with many going thousands of rounds without a hiccup. But how many revolver stoppages, per round fired, have you seen
vis a vis auto malfs?
I'll not count the woes I read on the board or hear from customers in the shop, and go with solely personal experiences:
The last revolver malfunction I personally saw was about three years ago, when some warm 240gr loads tied up my Rossi 720. About a year before that, a bent moonclip in my 625 caused the DA pull to be impossibly heavy.
With autos, in the last three years I've seen: A Glock 31 that wouldn't feed from postban mags, a USP9C that jammed on WallyWorld White Box ball, a Delta Elite that didn't like being shot one-handed with target loads, my Pro choke on the last round in the mag because I didn't clean it for a blue million rounds, some Wilson mags with worn springs cause FTF's on the last round in the same gun, a BDM hiccup inexplicably on a round of FMJ, a Detonics that has intermittent FTF problems, and on, and on, and on.
Yes, revolvers can and do malf, but to say that it happens anywhere near as often as a semiauto is just not borne out by experience.
(As far as word of mouth goes: for every revolver brought in the shop for actual mechanical function problems, I'd wager that we see a hundred or more semiautos. On the boards, a quick glance over at the semiauto forum shows "Help!" threads about a SIG P-220, a Walther TPH, a Kimber Ultra CDP, a Taurus PT-92, an HK P7M8, and that's just going by thread titles. How many guys on the revolver forum are complaining about limpwristing, FTF's, double feeds, type three malfs, stovepipes, ammo incompatability, tap-rack-bang drills, et cetera?)
A final note: I am in no way suggesting that a semiauto is not reliable enough for CCW, as there's one on my belt now. But if someone walked into the house right now and said: "If you can have one gun you own fire a full load of ammo with no malfunctions of any type, I'll give you this check for one million dollars," I'd go pick up my Smith Military & Police and start planning on how I was going to spend the money.