This particular battle for learning was lost a long time ago. If university stopped providing an earnings boost from attending, 90% of students would quit tomorrow.

It doesn’t help that a lot of desirable fields are comically out of date at the academic instructional level anyway.

Would you honestly tell an aspiring software engineer that your typical computer science degree will teach them much about wielding computers in a cutting edge way?

If I were to list the top 5 things I got from university, knowledge wouldn’t make the cut and were I to do it again, I would certainly attend less class.

> If university stopped providing an earnings boost from attending, 90% of students would quit tomorrow.

Maybe 10–20% would quit for that reason. There would be more attrition if you could get common jobs (such as teacher or nurse) that currently require a degree but don't pay that well without formal education.

Most people don't care that much about money. Sure they would like to have more money, but it's not the primary factor that drives their major life decisions. People are generally more interested in stable careers that pay their bills and seem like something they could continue doing until retirement.

Anyone who thinks that a Computer Science degree is supposed to prepare them for a job as a Software Engineer has completely missed the point. It's like getting a Physics degree for a job as a Mechanical Engineer. There is some overlap but a huge difference in focus on theoretical versus practical topics.