One of the best tools I've found for manipulating JSON via JsonPath syntax is https://jsonata.org

In addition to simple queries that allow you to select one (or multiple) matching nodes, it also provides some helper functions, such as arithmetic, comparisons, sorting, grouping, datetime manipulation, and aggregation (e.g. sum, max, min).

It's written in JS and can be used in Node or in the browser, and there's also a Python wrapper: https://pypi.org/project/pyjsonata/

Is the necessity of tools like JSON Path really just an indication that APIs are increasingly returning too much junk and / or way more data than the client actually requested and / or needs?

In dev mode, our internal APIs return pretty printed JSON so one can inspect via view-source, more, or text editor.

I am kind of surprised that they don't mention jq at all, it seems like a similar tool that is fairly wide spread.