The timing of this is an interesting topic. TLDR: 3d printing may be 10/100x more accessible than it was - it's still incredibly inaccessible.

It does seem common for engineer types to get head of themselves after conflating upper middle class nerds who live in the suburbs/exurbs with 'everyone'. The most common old trope being that things they think are straight forward - to normies - are hopping on one foot, hoolahooping, on a unicycle, balancing a bike on your face.

There's a great deal of technical know how to be able to 3d print...aside from the cost of the printers (which is significant, and there's no clear 'leaders' (from a non-printer perspective).

The barriers to entry are much more than people realize. #6 perhaps seems the most relevant to your comment.

1. Cost of printer.

2. Will I have a steady supply of plastics

3. Will the company I buy from be in business in 5 years (etc), and even if they are, will it just be some nerds that are too busy to help with customer service because "like....they should just check the documentation".

4. Do you have the time to learn some CAD software.

5. Is there a cad software that's good that's open source or reasonably priced that will allow me to design the thing that I want to use it for.

6. Is there a SINGLE place (2? 3?) that I can go to when I want to print something to click a button and have the print come out (like a laser printer, that prints with ink)

I've wanted a 3d printer for at least a few years, but it still doesn't make sense to me, and those who use them are notoriously difficult to 'hobby' with.