As someone who don't know how to use Photoshop, it's interesting to learn (as you said) that, most the difference is only contrast and saturation.
The final image just looked so much better than the second last one for me.
The final image just looked so much better than the second last one for me.
Another simple but subtle advantage is you can do these corrections in a perceptual or near perceptual color space like CIELAB, rather than simple RGB. Particularly when you're pushing saturation this gives more natural looking outcomes.