Gas Station Attendants

What is it with some states requiring that a gas station attendant must be the one to pump the gas into your vehicle? It makes me crazy on several levels - I know - it's a control thing - I want to be able to control how fuel gets put into my gas tank. But there are annoying things about the other guy doing it. For instance, this morning I had the experience and was greeted by a cranky Russian man who was annoyed that I interrupted his coffee, danish, and cigarette. Then, it appeared he hadn't had enough time doing the job to get the swiping skill required to run your credit card through the payment machine - and so he kept running it through over and over - rubbing the magnetic strip down to a mint strip. He then proceeded to put the gas pump into the car and forced it in so far (this is starting to sound like mechanic porn) that it keeps autostopping (you know that lovely feature to prevent spillage). He finally put it in upside down after banging up the hole quite a bit. He then went back indoors to work on his danish again and nearly forgot I was there. I fianlly had to honk 5 minutes after the pump was finished to get him to complete his duties. I understand that these are underpaid prediminantly depressed individuals, but why does a state decide that it is safer to have an underpaid angry Russian smoker pump your gas than the owner of the vehicle?