A lot of 18-year-olds are not really very mature these days either. Kids are generally more sheltered, less independent, and have less experience managing their own lives than previous generations. That is why universities now have huge bureaucracies to deal with students who are physically adults but emotionally unprepared to manage their lives and take responsibility for their behavior, actions, and decisions without parents guiding everything.

So taking a year or two to figure out how to be an adult is not the worst approach to take.

If more people decide to delay or seek alternatives to college, the higher ed bubble will burst. Universities will not be able to afford the administrative staff they are carrying if enrollments decline.