I can't think of a single game that manages to have enemies correspond to your level rather than area or story progression actually contribute to the game. It just makes trying to get better gear ultimately a pointless task because the enemies get strong at the same rate so you might as well stay weak.
I wouldn't say it's lazy (few things in gamedev are), but it's certainly less effort to do level scaling than it is to repeatedly test an incredibly long experience to make sure players never get too over leveled or under leveled. Level scaling is a pretty simple concept. Most units have their stats automatically distributed according to their level (this will allow you to use the same unit in multiple regions and still have it "work"). So, when a player enters a region, you loop over the monsters in the are and go "is this monster less than the player's level? if so, bump it up".
Level scaling is easier than not level scaling if you're trying to make a game where the player has a similar experience for most of the game. Especially in an RPG where players could choose to do or not do side quests or where players could grind levels. When you reach the next main story beat, the player could be any number of levels. I think for the vast majority of people (who want a relatively casual game experience), level scaling ends up being a huge benefit, even if it's frustrating to people like us that care a bit more deeply about the systems in a game.