And I'm sure that a lot of you will say that that's an indication that college is mostly a waste, but I don't think that that follows, necessarily; although I haven't been to college yet I feel vaguely that it'll be more rewarding than most things that I could think of to do otherwise, and certainly that it'll be more rewarding than most things that I would in all likelihood do otherwise.
But what if everybody (or almost everybody) prefers SUVs? And I guess we need to extend the analogy a little more: what if everybody needs a car, and their parents are buying them one, and the parents choose primarily based on cost, and hybrids cost less? But everybody wants an SUV. Maybe everybody wants an SUV to the extent that they'd be willing to personally pay for the difference in price, if they had the money. Oh, and maybe the SUVs are actually better for the environment.
...This analogy is terrible.
If you can give me some reason that the existence of something that performs most of the functions of college, but that is cheap enough to be a viable opportunity for people who work, or people who want to get their credentials faster or whatever, is such a threat to college that it must be stopped -- but college, despite its vulnerability to better ideas, is still worth keeping around -- I'd like to hear about it.
But that might be convoluted. So here's what I would ask: if we had the credentialing system and no college, how would you pitch the concept of a modern college to the typical VC?
The problem with this view is that some people just want the vocational part, and bundling it with something they don't want, but for which they will be charged, just makes them worse off. Being able to buy A or B is better than only being able to buy A and B.
It would be pretty annoying if some forward-thinking politician realized that a keyboard is worthless without a computer, and unilaterally banned the sale of keyboards that didn't come with a computer. But that would be a terrible plan.