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We have a money-based economy. Not in the same sense as oil-based, but a lot of economic activity takes place because someone borrows money, uses it to buy something big, and then repays the lender over time. This is true of homes and renovations. This is true of college degrees. This is true of many automobiles and major appliances. This is true of major government infrastructure projects. This is not directly true of factories and shipping companies and and startups, but even these compete for their funding with everything else that seeks funding.

The price of money up front is a big deal.

> I don't know why we focus so much on interest rates

It directly effects the supply of money which is a direct lever on the economy.

Inflation predated the oil crunch, but certainly the oil crunch exacerbated the problem. In general, economists probably understand the economy better than we do, so it's probably foolish to write them off in favor of some simplistic understanding of the economy.