The two options would be that either the perception is unsubstantiated but persists, or there has been a continuous decline for the last 40 years. I'm strongly leaning towards the latter. I also having the same issues in the 00s looking at old sets from the 80s, and looking back now the 00s look much better than what we have today. Obviously not in every way, and not all recent sets were bad. But overall I have the feeling that there's been a steady trend that the bricks got better but the sets got worse
But I think most people either agree there was a dark ages where they went almost bankrupt and did some really questionable themes, or the best time was when they were a kid.
The 90s catalogs rocked in a way that no website ever can, though.