> As somebody who missed out on that, I ended up paying around $400 as an adult for 6 hours of private lessons (yes, that was it), plus a $60 fee for the driver's license and a $9 fee for the driving test.

Never happened for me either. A few years ago I payed a similar amount for a handful of very short courses that didn’t leave me confident enough to take the test. The consequences are big degradation of QoL. Now looking at probably 1 or 2 grand for significantly longer courses which I’m not even sure will be enough, along with the fact that these sort of places are not compatible with a working adults schedule.

Is it? Where I went to High School they stopped offering drivers education in the 1980s, for budget reasons. Everyone now takes private drivers training courses, or just learns from their parents.