I had a great manager at my last company. Very good people person, would read on his own time to try and improve himself, etc. He had also been in our department the longest - upper management was always coming and going every 2-3 years. I asked him one time why he didn't want to go for one of those higher level positions and would rather stay at this sort of stressful one after a decade. He said he didn't want to deal with all the headaches at that level (more meetings with C-level people). He just wanted to keep his head down, take care of his team, and go home (a 1-2 hr commute each way).
Given the precarity of much existence in the US, and the ability to be fired on a whim, it's no wonder the 'drone' mentality, of not bucking the system, is pretty normal. Suck up the BS until you can retire. I guess at least these days most of us don't have to deal with hot tar.