I get your sentiment, I've been through a few hype cycles as well, but besides learning that history repeats itself, there is no saying how it will repeat itself.
I don't know why this is a bad thing. I don't think projects that you believe are nonsensical shouldn't exist just because of your opinion, especially if they're helping people survive in this world. I'm sure the people working on them don't think they're nonsensical.
Yet society and economy keeps going and nobody apart from some academic discussions really cares. I mean companies have 100% incentive to trim fat to raise income yet they only do the least minimum.
Rise of antidepressants imply otherwise.
The more bullshit we stop doing, the more energy there is for the awesome things we could do instead.
The arts have a place in society. Tackling real problems like hunger or health do too, arguably more so - they create the space for society to tolerate, if not enjoy art.
But the down side is we have a huge smear of jobs that either don't really matter or only matter for the smallest of moments that exist in this middle ground. I like to think of a travel agent of yesteryear as the perfect example: someone who makes a professional experience of organising your leisure so you don't have to; using questionable industry deals. This individual does not have your consumer interests at heart, because being nice to you is not where the profit is generally. The only role they actually play is rent seeking.
Efficiency threatens the rent seeking models of right now, but at the same time leads to a Cambrian explosion of new ones.