This was an interesting article. I think the preference for bureaucracy, bloat and inefficiency over lean and efficient craftsmanship is caused by several factors:

- The largest, most successful companies which set the industry standards have market monopolies so there is no pressure for them to use their 'human resources' efficiently. So long as the end product works, they don't care if it took 1000 engineers to build and requires constant maintenance and annual rewrites... Unfortunately, most of these engineers who work for these extremely wealthy corporations believe themselves to be the best engineers in the world and they believe that it’s their duty and their right to preach and impose their bureaucratic practices onto the rest of the industry globally. The high-profile cogs in the big machine get to dictate to the free-thinking craftsmen how things must be done and the craftsmen are not allowed to question it; not if they want a job in the industry!

- Reserve banks which control the inflows of new currency into the economy are mandated to maximize employment, not value creation - This attitude ends up being reflected in corporate environments which benefit from expansionary monetary policies. Reserve banks keep the money printers running hot so long as big corporations keep fulfilling their end of the political bargain; which is to keep creating more jobs and to indoctrinate their employees into left-wing ideology; this helps favorable left-wing politicians get re-elected and it perpetuates the cycle of corporation-friendly monetary policies. Friendly regulations and monetary (and fiscal) policies help corporations to maintain their monopolies and it all feeds back into the first point above.