I don't agree at all. The new bloatware is spyware and tracking and advertising and "offers" and popups and subscription upsells. No matter how free you consider my resources, the software actually does bad things that I don't want it to do.

Smartphones have been an important counterweight to exponential growth in system requirements. They (especially Android phones) have slow CPUs, slower and metered Internet connections, and limited storage. I attribute the shift to "flat" user interfaces to popular adoption of mobile devices. Some people use them as their only computer.

Even above average workstations still have constraints. Those above average specs will eventually be adopted by the masses and a chat app will only function on a system with 16GB of RAM.

Maybe for you. Did you heard that Intel processors can decrease the speed when the processor is hot ? And when you have 4 cores and Excel is keeping one at 100% load the other 3 will have reduced speed. But the other 3 must run all the services in the modern, secure OS which is Win 10. Good luck doing something else with that computer while Excel is calculating.