> The idea of the public university is to bring a traditionally aristocratic practice - the devotion of several years of one’s young life to not-necessarily-practical intellectual pursuits - to the middle class

The entire idea that spending 4 years learning useless knowledge is somehow valuable is completely mistaken bullshit.

Aristocrats could get away with it because they were rich but there is 0 evidence this practice brought fundamental value to them or society other than serving as an expensive status signal.