People need to understand that the majority of Stellaris's playerbase isn't grand strategy players who want to stare at spreadsheets and pie charts, even though those players are obviously overrepresented on this forum.
Removing pops would take away a large amount of flavor and intuitiveness from the game and make it less interesting. Just like removing the tile system already did. I warned against that change back then, and ever since the change to the jobs system, the game has struggled to regain both identity and balance. Even worse: The very thing the tile system was removed to combat - micromanagement - only got worse after the change.
Having little alien dudes on your planets is at the heart of Stellaris. It always has been and always will be. A pop-free game would need to be Stellaris 2. Don't encourage the devs to ruin this game for a second time. Besides, even the relatively smaller overhaul for 3.0 has semi-broken the game yet again - another total overhaul would mean YEARS more of the game in a broken state.
I don't entirely disagree with you here. Although I would argue that the term spreadsheet and pie charts, while seeming grey and dull, can be anything but, if the gameplay systems behind them are engaging, fun and have noticeable results, then they in turn can be fun to play around with.
But I think you are right, about the original problem, being the pop and job rework, from the original tile system.
I have said in other posts. I like micromanagement.
IF it is done well. Otherwise, I would prefer a simple system, over a broken one.
The original tile system, wasn't anything to write home about, it wasn't very deep, it wasn't super engaging or hard, there were definate ways to maximise it, which meant that once a planet was "done" you never really went back to it. (<---Isn't that what we look for in automation of a game system??? Why did they change this?)
It worked. The problem was, that the AI wasn't very challenging, even then. The late game crises could be buggy and again, didn't present much challenge and as such, players wanted... more to do, more challenge and I think, the devs solution, was to diversify the economic game. But in doing so, they introduced more problems than they fixed, because the system they changed, didn't really have much to do with the underlying problems. It gave people things to do, because the new jobs/pops system was more busy work, than strategy and that is the worst kind of micro. It also introduced the worst hit to performance in any PDX game.
I say that last, as someone, who has had heavy issues with performance on multiple custom rigs with highly diverse specs and settings.
But instead of recognising that, if truth be told, the changes they made, only introduced more problems and instead of rolling back or finding a better fix, they have been trying to shore up the new system (and it's never going to work, because, to my belief, it is fundamentally flawed)
Some of us are now saying, we need something different, even if the realistic chances of getting such a change are slim, I think it's important to make it known, that the new system is not just suboptimal, but unfit for purpose. Not doing so, just invites PDX to make similar mistakes in the future (mistakes ofcourse, are okay! Everyone makes them, gods know I do, we get better and learn more from the mistakes we make than the successes, but only if we can face down those mistakes)
So I get what you're saying, that not everyone wants a Vicky2 style population and economic system. I reference that one, because it was pretty deep, sound and stable, but I would be open to practically any alternative to the one we have, including something more simple (because it's better to do simple and works, than complex and doesn't)
I'd also like to touch on what you say about different people looking for different things and you're entirely right.
I think those that are happy with the current POP system, are the sort that look for game balance, who are focused on "winning the game" in the traditional sense. They seem to be the ones who say "you're upset because you can't min/max anymore" yet they are the people, who are most likely to min/max, finding the optimal way to overcome the global pop growth modifier requires very specific mechanical workarounds to optimise your pop growth... min/maxing! They are the same people that wanted a more diverse pop/job system. More involved economics, because that's the numbers games they play. It literally did nothing for those of us, who wanted more scenarios, more opportunities to tell a narrative story about our races, their empires and the journey they were on.
The people who want to have an experience, are the ones saying, this isn't working. We didn't want a more complex system, we wanted more going on lategame (I think PDX have figured out that what people want is situational opportunity, stories they can tell, through the framework of the gameplay. We see it in the emerging design direction of Crusader Kings 3 and the theme of Stellaris latest DLC) but before the realised that, they listened to those people who wanted more "numbers"
So we go Megacorp. We got the new system and we got all the problems of balance and performance that come from those changes.
Now it's a battle to rebalance everything, to make the whole work together and frankly, I don't think it's possible.
So I hear what you're saying and I actually agree with you, but short of making a huge U turn on this (which I don't think PDX will be able to countenance) we need to make suggestions that might ameliorate the problems enough, that we can get back to the stories we like to tell (and ofcourse, play out.)