The login site for my work does everything server side and serves up vanilla html that looks "from the 90s" in the context of present websites. After some slight adjustment, it's heavenly, a miracle of consistency and keyboard shortcuts.

And yeah, the thing is both designers and managers want a misable GUI that looks like a floating cloud. From their point of view, that is better. GUIs with little functionality but pointing the user at what they are supposed to do. Treating the user like a moron, not because the user inherently is one but it's convenient if they are.