It seems like the missing piece for you is that RDF is one level of abstraction higher than what you're talking about.
If you're just thinking about parsing data out of the above XML snippet, yeah, of course it's more complicated. But the point of RDF is that you don't think about the serialization format (there's libraries for that). You should be thinking about your data at a higher level of abstraction, at the level of "triples" and "inference rules".
You're expected to use a triples database and an inference engine of some kind, either a library or by rolling your own. If you're not, then I agree, you're not deriving any benefit from RDF. But if you are, then it lets you deal with your data in a more abstract, generalized way that does provide legitimate value for certain use cases.
If you're just thinking about parsing data out of the above XML snippet, yeah, of course it's more complicated. But the point of RDF is that you don't think about the serialization format (there's libraries for that). You should be thinking about your data at a higher level of abstraction, at the level of "triples" and "inference rules".
You're expected to use a triples database and an inference engine of some kind, either a library or by rolling your own. If you're not, then I agree, you're not deriving any benefit from RDF. But if you are, then it lets you deal with your data in a more abstract, generalized way that does provide legitimate value for certain use cases.