As with any program it depends how you use it. I bet there are people out there who use their points for toasters and are thrilled at the ability to do that. I would find that a disastrous waste of points and destruction of potential value.

For me, the main pillars of the program that make points valuable are:

1. The ability to earn through CC spend (especially now that the ability to earn through flying has been neutered for my travel patterns)
2. The broad availability even though it can be expensive to utilize all of that availability
3. PRs - the SE ones have the most value by far but I still used the PY ones I used to get when I was 75k to great effect
4. The ability to book latitude and PY flex tickets and upgrade (whether immediately or not)
5. Free award changes as an SE
6. Family points pooling

The other factors that influence my ability to gain value are a flexible schedule (I take a lot of 3-7 day trips through the year and can choose when and where to travel) and the ability to make SDCs. I also travel largely on my own dime.

I benchmark all of my redemptions. The minimum redemption value I'll accept is 3c/mile. Once I factor in my blended earning rate through bonuses, CC earning and flight earning, this is the equivalent of roughly 5% cash back if the total value is applied against just the CC spend. More frequently, I am redeeming between 6c/mile and 10c/mile. That works out to a return on spend of 10-17%. I can't imagine another way I could get that much value against my CC spend.

Sure, there is downward pressure on value with the changes and if I wasn't SE and didn't apply some skill to find good redemptions (ie use stopovers, use positioning flights, understand when revenue management is likely to drop redemption prices due to loads, understand upgrade likelihood etc), it wouldn't be nearly as good. As it stands, the program still has a lot of value for me.