"...why wasn't it gotten rid of 30 years ago?"

Because it's the vector for parasitism. Within paperwork, and algorithms today, are concealed the harvest of our wealth by parasites. Wherever we intersect with paperwork, parasites have their bloody probosces jammed into our production, and the worst is where we suck at the government teat for welfare, because that has already been sucked out of us and shat out by parasites before we suck at it, whereupon they suck it out of us again after we have turned it into our sweet bloody treasure.

"Money becomes god."

This is the essence of the monstrous evil destroying civilization. 'The love of money is the root of all evil.' Turning money into an object of veneration, even of worship, is the proselytization of the unholy evil religion that is the enemy of humanity. I have learned money is a vector of boundless evil, wreaking immense harm on me and mine. Therefore I have the opposite of love of money: I avoid it like the plague. Wherever money intrudes on my life, paperwork or some digital record arises, from receipts at the market to statements at the bank, and all of these are vectors of my valuable production being extracted by vile evil.

I endeavor to not interact via such mechanisms with all my might. I seek to interact with individuals directly outside of any such channels so that all my production is immune to parasitic extraction. Goodwill is immune. Parasites can't steal it, can't profit from it in any way. Every goodwill transaction keeps all the wealth concerned out of the maw of the parasitic monster consuming the life's blood of humanity.

That's my only real economic goal, TBH. The more of us that do more of that, the less wealth and power the monster destroying civilization has to wreak destruction, and the more robust humanity and civil society becomes to withstand that destruction. Good is the opposite of evil. Do good. That's what to do.

Thanks!