Are travel/points cards worth it for economy travel?

I've been team cash back for few years, but I've been looking into the travel side recently. As the title says, I'm just curious if travel cards are worth it for economy travel? In all of the research I've done people have made some incredible examples of tripling or quadrupling their point value by surgically selecting deals, but they all have one common denominator: luxury. I personally couldn't care less about 1st/Business class flights or extravagant hotels. I'm fine with budget seats and good enough hotels/hostels in order to save money. I completely understand that you can multiply the value of your points, but you still have to spend $5,000 on that round trip instead of $1,200. Does anyone have examples of getting that kind of value/force multiplier on economy trips? Getting a $600 flight to hawaii for $200? Getting a $200 hotel room for $50?

Tl;dr: Looking for examples of good return for economy travel using travel cards/points.