While a great idea for learning and purely academic purposes, a degree from such a co-op would mean nothing to potential employers. Actually, it would mean nothing to anyone. At least in the U.S., an institution must be accredited for the degree to mean anything at all.

That said, I would definitely join such a co-op as I feel the knowledge is more important than the paperwork anyways.

Why offer a degree when a BA in English isn't worth the paper it's printed on to employers? This is about knowledge, as you say. An affordable, liberal education, not a pipeline to Goldman Sachs.

For those seeking ROI, boot camps are already providing a compelling vocational alternative.

The increase in tuition (and fees) make up for budget shortfalls everywhere (fancy facilities are actually not all that big of a deal if you crunch the numbers).

At the same time, getting rid of tenured positions is a decent means of cutting costs to try to address the same shortfall.

Sounds like a death spiral. My father got a PhD in history so he could be a professor. If he couldn't expect that, he would have gone to business school, reducing the demand for history professors and so on until there's none left. You get it.

At the moment, there is a surplus supply of PhDs. If, at some point, that gets corrected, things may change.

Though I should note that PhD students in history aren't major drivers of demand for professors of history - undergraduates are.

In the sciences, there's a bit more of an incentive to have lots of graduate students.