Absolutely spot on this is a critical distinction that often gets overlooked. The obsession with "block size" misses the deeper issue: it's the UTXO set that dictates the ongoing resource burden of running a node, not the historical chain size. A bloated UTXO set increases RAM and I/O requirements every time the node validates new transactions not just during initial sync. This is why devs are much more concerned about things like dust outputs and BRC-20s than about OP_RETURN junk. If we want Bitcoin to remain decentralized and verifiable by everyday users on modest hardware, keeping the UTXO set lean is far more important than trimming megabytes off old block data.