Nice thought, but I’m not sure I agree with your assertion #1. The most important professions for our future growth require hard science education. It is not likely that, for example, a chip designer or mechanical engineer would learn the required math on the job.
Economic growth will be driven by technological innovation and development, not by hiring a bunch of people to wait tables at Chili’s and screw lug nuts onto cars on an assembly line.
I absolutely agree.
At the age of 18 two of my homeschoolers finished B.S. degrees in mathematics so I fully understand that for the economic health of our economy that the STEM professions will be the most important, but that work will be reserved for those with the highest IQs. Please note that I did not recommend that all college attendance be eliminated for all people.
For my children, most of their STEM courses were offered in a very rigid and lockstep manner. Some were available only once a year. As for the humanities, many of these, today, can be taken by way of the Internet. Even with the primitive Internet resources that we have today, my children's time spent on campus could have easily been reduced by 25 to 30%. They could have easily finished B.S. degrees in mathematics by the age of 16 or 17.
Once upon a time, ( not so long ago) men did learn to be engineers on the job. My father is an example. He worked for an energy company and was one of their highest ranked ( and paid) engineers.His education was a combination of mentoring, night college classes at Drexel Institute of Technology, and workplace college courses. He directed his company's portion of the emergency power systems for Mercury and Apollo space missions.
For most of the work done in the U.S. ( for example, night manager of Wendy's or check-in clerk at the Marriott) a solid and certifiable 8th grade education, combined with internships, mentoring, Internet course work, some college night classes, and workplace courses should be **more** than enough. That the supervisor of the car rental cleanup crew needs to have attended college would be absolutely laughable to my grandparents and great grandparents.
Sadly, given the high numbers of high school **graduates** sitting in community college remedial courses, few students are graduating from high school with even an 8th grade education.
Employers demand college for their employees for two reasons. ( I know because I was once an employer)
1) They can.
2) It is just about the only way to guarantee that an employee is reasonably literate. College attendance does not mean they understand simple fractions or decimals.
If I had received resumes with lists of **certifiable** Coursera or Khan Academy mastery of a solid 8th grade education they would have won an interview far faster that even those attending community college. Gee! At least I would know they knew the difference between a millimeter and 1/8th of an inch.
Then why would they need to learn it?