Town centres were long the fulcrum point of any town since time immemorial and it is only in fairly recent times that the Houses of Mammon saw car ownership to lead to success of out of town retail shopping developments and since then, the last thirty years or so saw the internet use grow year by year and certain commercial entities saw a new market niche for internet shopping. I see you make no mention of the number of retail jobs that have been lost over the recent years, with even large well-known retail giants of the high street such as House of Fraser, Marks and Spencer, British Home Stores, etc, not protected.
I am 74 and suffered at stroke in July 2012 and have never driven since that date and my good lady wife is 77 and unfortunately in the first stages of a dementia-type affliction, causing her to stop driving immediately on the advice of her consultant, giving her Land Rover Discovery to one of my sons. We live, as many on this website already know, in an 18th century six-bedroom two story residence which originally was the land agents offices of a nearby stately home and we are two miles away from the nearest railway station and a bus stop. Indeed, I would love to have a barouche pulled by noble equine steeds as you suggest, but content ourselves that our village has a rather good executive taxi service that meets our daily needs.
You and your dear lady wife are slightly younger than my parents. As a family we lived like you, in a rural area and the local town hadn't got any supermarkets at all, because they had yet to arrive on the scene. Groceries were delivered from the local village stores, as was bread and dairy from local amenities in the village. The first supermarkets in the nearest town centre didn't arrive with the motor car but because of market forces, relatively cheap home freezing and most of all, lower prices leaving the village stores and village bakery to go to the wall.
So now, deliveries are made to our door, whether from Tesco, Waitrose, Amazon or any other online retailer and in some ways, things have gone full circle, no?
I agree that Town Centres became market hubs for communities but now they don't need to provide this for shopping and towns need to adapt, less retail, more entertainment. My local market town used to be Hitchin. Hitchin went through the doldrums but now is thriving like never before. Shops still exist but are more niche and most footfall is for leisure activities where people meet and socialise, just as they would have done in your time immemorial.
The point I make to your post is that things change and rarely do they return exactly to how they used to be, if at all. Job markets come and go and yes, there will be many high street retail jobs that are no longer needed as before but plenty of delivery drivers clogging our roads.
I have elderly relatives who are ever facing challenges of getting their provisions and unlike yourself, internet as a means of securing home delivery is not an option. Moving from a family home that no longer meets their needs is a challenging consideration however.
On the original question of whether those that cause economic damage be given jail sentences? There are a few that probably deserve the focus of the law, maybe at the Hague rather than the Old Bailly springs to mind given illegal wars and arms trading. On the whole though, no, I don't think so as we will have voted for them. Greater accountability would be a good start however, not just for those who lie to us that we then vote for & choose to lead, but for those of us making the choices. For instance, if Brexit does turn out to create a real crisis in our country, how many who made this their choice will want to hold their hands up and concede that they made the wrong choice, opposed to choosing to look for someone else to blame?