I have read where you are not supposed to throw all your pixels away at one time when down sampling but to stair step instead. I always did it it one swoop and have not seen any better results by doing the latter. Input please.

you really can read almost anything on t'internet.

I can almost see a dim fuzzy string of logic that might lead you to stair stepping your image sizes. (it could equally be one of those historic things from before advanced software algorithms for resizing were available or indeed able to be implemented adequately)

But I strongly doubt there is any visible benefit from doing this with a modern machine.

There was supposed to be a benefit with early versions of PS - but not now.