It takes maybe 5 minutes to remove the pan. Is your time so precious that you can't spare 5 minutes to remove the darn thing? Car companies don't add anything to their product that they don't absolutely feel is necessary, if they can leave it off and save five cents they'll do it just to improve their bottom line. Personally, I feel it has to add to the aerodynamics of the car, while offering some protection from foreign objects coming in from underneath. I've owned over 100 cars in the last 54 years and only damaged one oil pan (when my car bottomed out when hitting a dip in the road at high speed) but it instantly put a hole in my oil pan and side lined my car for a couple of days. If that particular car would have had a belly pan, I'm pretty sure it would have prevented the pan damage.