Plans were circulated, but it turns out to be a devilishly difficult problem to solve, incredibly expensive, and not as big as most people think.
Most satellites are properly disposed of these days. Satellites in low Earth orbit either re-enter the atmosphere on their own due to air resistance or are intentionally removed from their orbit towards the end of their lifespan. Satellites in geosynchronous orbits are moved to a graveyard orbit where they cannot interfere with active satellites.
However, this doesn't mean that debris isn't a problem. Everything from loose cameras to paint splatters is floating around in Earth's orbit, and all of these things can be deadly if they hit an astronaut or satellite at orbital speeds.
The problem with collecting debris in space is that the large objects are easy to detect and avoid, while the really small objects - which can still be deadly - are extremely difficult to detect and therefore difficult to capture with a debris-collecting satellite.
The low-hanging fruit—which we'll probably do first—is moving satellites that die prematurely. When a satellite is placed into a geosynchronous orbit, the plan is always to move it to a graveyard orbit at the end of its life, but if the satellite dies prematurely, it's stuck where it is. If we could launch a cheap shuttle that would attach itself to the dead satellite and move it to the graveyard orbit where it was meant to end up, that might be worth considering.
It's worth noting that every single graphic that attempts to show the "crowded" space around the Earth is misleading. Consider images like this one:
...and this...
These images give the impression that we can barely squeeze in another satellite. The problem is that each of these graphics massively overestimates the size of the satellites.
A typical satellite is about the size of an SUV, but in the second image above, it's depicted as if all the satellites were the size of the greater Atlanta area. In the first image, the satellites are the size of several countries. I understand why they do this—if they showed the satellites to scale, you wouldn't be able to see them—but most people take these graphics at face value.
Space debris is not yet a crisis, but it is something we need to think about, and thankfully some people are.