My Mexico experience has been in setting of the average local. The life experience of the average Jose is not grand. The cops and the street gangs are hard to distinguish from one another. Mexico will improve when they a)get a group of honest officials and b) dump socialism.
Your experience of the "average Jose" is a little like trying to find the experience of the "average Joe" here in the USA. Mexico, like the USA, has a wild variety of living conditions, political climates, and economic opportunities.
Quite frankly, I'm planning on retiring to Mexico provided the Mexican government reforms their awful property laws.
You are correct that history of Mexican government, starting with the Spanish, has been a history of dismal failure. Then again, what former Spanish colony has a good government?