Delta had (and did when this was first posted almost a year ago) a no questions asked 24 hour refund policy. Perhaps the OP was pushing the agent to merely change the reservation which, no matter when it's done, carries a fee. Had s/he simply requested a refund s/he could have re-booked it from scratch online. Of course we don't know if it was really inside that 24 hour window or not.
Unfortunately offering better service at a fair price would mean increasing fares across the board. Airlines are constantly adjusting their fares for advanced bookings to test the waters of just what the market will bear. Recently, fueled by a major fare cut offered by Southwest, they lowered fares from mid-September through mid-November to "bargain basement" levels. As soon as the sale was over the fares only briefly went back to the pre-sale levels but then edged back downward when bookings dropped significantly. If they need to keep dropping fares to stimulate bookings then they have to make up for it somewhere.
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