That's by design. Sanctions put pressure to the country as a whole. Once people start getting angry they will question their leadership and maybe demand for changes.
Sure, sanctions can also target specific individuals, like the russian elite, olygarchs, but that alone doesn't change the status quo.
Economic sanctions are not great, but they're meant to be an alternative to war. When you really need a country to change course, anything you can do is going to involve hurting regular citizens there, it's just about finding the least bad option.
That's what the US has always been doing.
Been a while since I've heard this kind of BS. The "design" does not work.
I see it as a loss-loss situation: Either nobody cares and autocracies get a free pass to do what they want in the global stage, or countries can react and restrain relations with governments based on some (sometimes subjective and biased, sure) criteria.