The bean counters, and I am not one, are only doing what the shareholders want: to increase the revenues per share, whichever the consequences are.
In all too many cases, this has been overtaken by the desire to increase shareholder value, which is not the same thing. Dividends and buybacks don't increase revenue, but they increase share price while diverting cash that would otherwise be used for internal investment, such as creating soundly engineered new products.