‘Enshittification’ is coming for absolutely everything
Read the smartest guys in the room. Enron had a somewhat similar issue.
The people making these decisions have their pay check/bonus decided on however much theoretical value they could book immediately. Enron would book the theoretical profits from any deal immediately and the deal maker would get bonuses based on theoretical profit, there was no incentive to actually see the deal through until the end as that would take time away from the next deal and the next bonus. The person you were arguing with either had a structure like this or took orders from somebody that did. It didn’t matter that in the long run it would cost the company more because for that one quarter they cut packing spending by 10% and get a bonus based off of the money “saved”.