[bfeynman]

It's because politician's focus is to keep themselves employed and re elected, with entirely short term focus. They have special interests from the wealthy who try to influence policy, and usually wealthy people are in a system of making income off of others (i.e ownership).

To your point, it must just be a modern phenomena of the 24/7 news cycle and internet to get loud voices out there faster. Because if you look at the rust belt and places like Ohio that were thriving industrial cities you can clearly see that places come and go. Detroit is another good example of a new less glamorous normal. There are certain benefits of density w.r.t to economics and such but a river runs its course, if you try to mess with it one way it will eventually change in another.