You just have to fire 80% of the administration, kill all of the "programs" which are trying to do this or that, and focus on A) providing the basic resources for academics to study and B) providing the basic resources for teaching.

Universities need to do very much less that isn't directly related to research or teaching and stop pretending the lead administrator of a university is an important position. The president of a university should have the pay and prestige that goes along with administering the parking garage and cafeteria and have few responsibilities or accolades beyond that.

If you do this, you will destroy half of the top 20 hospital systems in the US, as they are run by Universities. Now maybe separating medical systems from universities is a good idea, but it's not simple by any means.

Government data on university expenditures show that at a broad level the increases in instructional and student-related expenditures are modest. Much of the increase is in the aforementioned medical systems, and in the Graduate and Faculty research enterprises:

https://nces.ed.gov/programs/digest/d22/tables/dt22_334.10.a...

But then how will the NFL run it's free feeder and athlete development program?

How will Disney get to profit off of selling college athletes as an entertainment product?

If college is accessible to even the poorest Americans, how will we maintain the claim that they are bastions of liberal brainwashing against millions of conservative people getting reasonable educations in basic things like "Political Science" that don't actually force them to become communists at all?

Who will ensure that only those who "Deserve" it can afford to get a degree through byzantine FAFSA workflows and departments? Who will ensure that being middle class means you have to pay out of pocket instead of getting a couple thousand dollars?!