finestkind;
I totally agree with your post. Times have changed for Management, worker and also the general public. Perhaps my experience may give a little insight into why I think this has happened.
After many years in aviation, I took a Coach Driving position for almost 10 years. When I started, the vast majority of passengers were regular travellers and the elderley. Mainly, I did the direct route to/from London and the fare was around the 12-15 UK pound mark. I would welcome every passenger on board whilst checking their ticket. If they had baggage, the passenger would place it in the hold themselves (obviously I would do so for those that were unable). All passengers would at least acknowledge you but the vast majority would have some conversational interaction with you.
I ended up having to leave the job due to having to do much more within the job and also having to put up with a rapid decrease in the attitude of the passengers. Why did this happen? Firstly the increased workload. When I started, it was the passengers responsibility to load their luggage. That then changed to still be the passengers responsibility but the driver may assisted if required. Then it was driver would assit and finaly it was the drivers responsibility to load all baggage. This increased the time taken to have all baggage and passengers loaded for the scheduled departure time. The Internet became available so that passengers could get their ticket from home instead of having to physically go to an Agent/Office to buy one. Then the bean counters decided to make ticket costs less by reducing a number of seats a lot cheaper (some down to UK pound 1). Then they decided that they would advertise the trip as a "shuttle" service of 'turn up and ride.' Now we started getting many passengers who turned up without a ticket. Each driver had an 'emergency' ticket book which previously might have been used maybe twice a year at the most. Now, we are faced with up to an average of 15 passengers who we had to write out tickets for and collect the money. Most of these passengers would be expecting to pay the UK pound 1 for their trip even though this was advertsised as only available on the Internet and in advance. Consequently us drivers were having to do much more just prior to departure whilst still trying to get an on-time departure. Our passengers were now having to wait longer for their baggage to be loaded, tickets issued and then being boarded. It doesn't take long now for the 'cultural' change to head in the wrong direction. The drivers are getting more stressed, the passengers are more stressed and the downward spiral continues. It ended up so bad that several drivers were physically assaulted for not giving people the UK pound 1 fares. Few passengers would even acknowledge the driver, let alone converse with him. The regular passengers started going by train and we were left with passengers who wanted the world for nothing and drivers who became totally dis-interested in their job. Yes, I had already had well over 40 years of Customer Service, so should have been able to 'ride the storm,' but I couldn't and shouldn't have had to anyway. I'm retired now and yes, the good old days were much better, pride in your job, respect for your Management and most of all, respect for your customers.