[gdl]

You seem to be commiting the common geek error of assuming that people are generally logical, and that they agree with your basic values. They aren't, and they don't.

College degrees are demanded, even when irrelevent to the job at hand, because that is a traditional way of getting better people. Most employers will accept and follow this as a cultural best practice because they don't have any reason to spend the time questioning it, and it is so engrained in our society that it is unlikely to get pushed aside by logic anyway. "College is useful" is as obvious to most people as is "1 + 1 = 2". If I show you a proof that the latter is not true, you will assume that the proof is flawed, not your belief. Most people are like that about most of their beliefs.

I do absolutely agree with you that college degrees are overrated most of the time. I think that you're overoptimistic about public illusions being shattered and all that though. The college industry is enormous, both economically and culturally, and will not go down easily.