and ... one can waste time and money for a few hours every day in it driving to and from work, so that one can then complain about having a shitty life.
It is indeed a common phenomena, but the problem is a great deal more complex than the automobile and the road. When you have corporations acting as turbopumps, doing their damnedest to absorb consumer spending power in the name of never-ending growth... It is not surprising that urban road use quite literally sucks the quality out of one's life.
I find it interesting that there seems to be so much fascination with modes of transport controlled by someone else in this day and age. I'd think cloud computing and most of the shenanigans tech companies get away with would have caused people pause when it comes to pawning off their control over their means of travel.
Taking the car just makes me really grumpy at other cars and people, such that I've often found I'm arriving home in a bad mood.
Each to their own, but I wouldn't rule out public transport (even with terrible rail operators).
By all means cars are great, until our devotion to them makes us build 12 lane freeways rather than civilized mass transit. Nothing screams civilized country like high speed and efficient trains.