I see your point but really, what percentage of development time is spent actually typing? A fraction of 1%? Maybe it's just me?
It also saves screen space - more can be fit on the screen horizontally, which means you can do more complex operations per line in C/C++ than you can in basic, particularly when manipulating memory, pointers, and other advanced operations. Most importantly, it saves precious disk space... just kidding ;)
But again, C/C++ isn't perfect, but it works, and it works well. It's true that C/C++ takes longer to learn how to read "fluently", but once you do, it's even more readable than BASIC variants. Complaining that C/C++ is a confusing language without first learning to read it fluently is like claiming that German/etc. is a confusing language without learning it.