Even so, I wouldn't dismiss using economic incentives as a means of solving many kinds of problems - for example, proof-of-work started-off as an anti-spam init

Even so, I wouldn't dismiss using economic incentives as a means of solving many kinds of problems - for example, proof-of-work started-off as an anti-spam initiative (which I feel still has potential), and outside of CS/SE I feel that cap-and-trade is viable approach to help reduce our aggregate carbon output, and so on. That the blockchain "brand" has been (irrevocably?) damanaged by fools and charlatans doesn't invalidate the potential of using economic-incentives to solve problems: both technical and societal.