I think everyone who does any kind of design goes through a period where they realize that we are designing a lot of crap that ends up in a landfill. You either rationalize it or try to do better work.
I don’t believe crime or poverty can ever really be “solved”, as they are universal human conditions that go back as long as we’ve been able to give them names, but that doesn’t mean we shouldn’t try. And yes, a lot of people are trying. Architecture For Humanity is a good starting place:
http://architectureforhumanity.org/