This is nothing new. When I was teaching econ, I typically had over 130 students in three classes. One history Full Prof had 4 students in three classes, and this was in the 1980’s. True, he was a bad teacher, but the university couldn’t fire him. However, some blame has to fall on the “feeder” institutions that are putting out students like these:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=7_pw8duzGUg
That’s incredibly painful to watch.