I worked with a well educated Saudi in a previous life (the only local in a company unit of 250) who told us that a basic problem with the Saudi workforce is that only 20% of working age adults were actually working and maybe half of those were actually qualified to do their jobs.
While it is probable that those numbers have improved somewhat since those days (mid 1990s), just imagine what a social upset a similar situation would cause in a campus full of "professional" entitled students on in an inner city neighborhood. "How dare they expect us to WORK for our entitled benefits!"
While these transitions can be done, they are not easy and have never been attempted on the KSA scale before. The Kingdom of Bahrain is probably the best example. They pumped out the last of their oil 40 years or so ago and made a successful transition into being the regions banking, shopping and tourist center. They also practice a far more laid-back and tolerant brand of Islam, save for a die-hard tribe of Shiites who are the source of almost all the crime and unrest in the idyllic little island kingdom.
I know an ex-Pat who taught STEM courses at one of their Universities. He said his students were lazy. They need to keep cutting the welfare benefits, both to encourage the locals to get off their duffs, but also because with population growing and oil revenues dropping there just isn’t the money for previous level benefits. It won’t be an easy transition even if it can succeed. And when they discover the well trained part of their population actually willing to work in tech fields is disproportionately female they’re really going to have difficulties with the crazies.
Remind me to tell a story about what happens when the oil runs out.