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"If we built our software more slowly and carefully but also with higher reliability and fewer issues with security, privacy and so on, would we really be worse off?"

Probably not. Personally I often enjoy the Wild West attitude of a lot of software development but on the other hand this industry has a really short memory and reinvents the wheel every few years. So yes, it would probably be a good idea if we held ourselves to higher standards and adopted best practices that often have been around for a long time.