I drove the length of California a year ago, and not a single solitary bug was on my windshield or grill. Completely coated, so you were driving you'd have to run the window washer and wipers every 15 minutes to clean the windshield so that you could see out of it.
California is heavily agricultural in the Central Valley, so I'm sure all the farmers spray the f-ck out of their land to kill every single bug.
Spray the length and width of the valley in a carpet of bug spray, year after year for decades, and there's not going to be any bugs left. Appropriate link: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=L5foZIKuEWQ&t=20s
My ancedotal evidence is that I feel like bugs have been less prevelent, on the other hand, the west is in a massive drought and I moved out west a few years ago, as I expect a chunk of smart netziens have aswell(with the technology boom). And we may be comparing our east coast childhoods with our western insect experiences.
Coming back east this year, there are plenty of bugs, its humid and west, much wetter than the west. However this did happen to be the year of the cicaeda swarm.
I haven't seen anything like this for years and years on my car - or anyone else's. I don't live in Germany anymore but haven't seen _anything_ like that in Massachusetts or California during the past decade.
Anecdata of course. But this is a thing of the past for me.