Just nitpicking - Baskerville 95% people won't have. Even less people will have 'Hoefler Text'. So you end up with most people seeing Georgia - you should focus on that experience. For some reason with Georgia there is gigantic word spacing. Like you would need like word-spacing: -0.6em to get somehow cool. Not sure why it happens on site or if its Georgia.
I see you have gripe with designers but you have to understand few things
1. There is as many bad designers as there is bad programmers. Lot of the companies hire quite unexperienced designers because it sort of works out. Don't forget designers get lot less money then programmers so it might also mean that the quality people are programmers by now.
2. Designing graphics is mostly about putting yourself into someone elses shoes. Nobody else in company has to like the design, important is that your clients do and for that you can gather data. Often you would be suprised what people actually like.
3. I have read this https://geoff.greer.fm/2018/04/02/conserve-vectical-pixels/ and it seems like you want to have very functional approach to design. But you have to realize that function in visual communication is not straightforward. Its not about cramming most of data on page. Empty space is extremely functional element. It might not be so important for you but for most people it is. It establishes hiearchy and helps to rest your eyes. 95% time you are not designing Bloomberg Terminal but some interface people will see for the first time or maybe just from time to time. Things might seem to you super obvious because you spent so many hours with them but thats just not what most of the people get. And i am not even talking about their experiences with the computer itself.