Very good points by the OP - some of them are reported on Canny but here the OP laid them out in a great way and the text became a very good overall of cthulhu too.
I’m a veteran of this type of game and play them since the original xcom, but I also don’t have much time to play anymore. So I play on veteran and in that difficulty resources are really scarce for me, even when I didn’t activate many bases. I usually take a LOT of real-life time to get to the end of a campaign - I didn’t even totally finish a single campaign because major patches or DLC arrive before I can and its best to start over… SO that’s why I hate anything grindy and do hope the team can get around this problem soon.
I love the game and try to follow up a bit here (more on canny as it takes less time) and also to play a bit when a major overhaul comes. I wish I could take a peek in the council board just to know which direction is being taken!