Depth perception of DCS

I've been wondering this for a while. When flying at let's say 30,000 feet and you look at the ground from your cockpit, why does it look like you are barely off the ground? In real life, you can hardly see small buildings and cant make out cars or other things but in dcs you can. No matter how high I go, it doesnt seem like im that far up. Yes, im playing on pancake mode, not vr