HIGHER EDUCATION BUBBLE UPDATE: The Last Leg Universities Stand On Is Collapsing.
They have long ceased being the best way to gain knowledge.
More recently, the degrees they confer have ceased being the best way to signal employability; the only exception being jobs that legally require them. (Such jobs are increasingly stodgy, unattractive, bureaucratic, backwards, and subservient to tyrannical governments).
The final leg universities stand on is the mythology of social status. That’s it. That’s what gives them what waning power they have.
I can’t count the number of parents I’ve talked with who recognize that college is one of the worst places to learn and degrees are one of the weakest ways to try to get hired, but who still needlessly bite the bullet and send their kid anyway.
I’ve noticed a real change in attitudes over the past decades, even among academic/professional types.