Education is a funded public good, I won't say well funded, but funded nonetheless. Credentials are not a well funded public good, and shouldn't be in my opinion.
If you think of education as a public utility, something that unequivocally raises the standard of living, then it becomes about forming a population of educated and informed citizens who can, amongst other things, participate in democracy a lot more effectively.
Without credentials, how are non-experts able to tell real experts from charlatans?
I realize we don't seem to mind that in software, but software is still a new field, so even though it's known to have a lot of shoddy snake oil peddlers, people still put up with the situation. For now.
But for the most part, when any of use needs to hire an expert, if there were no credentials, what would we do? Count on our ability to somehow suss out expertise without actually having anything resembling expertise in the field? Word of mouth and hope for the best? Set a war chest aside for the inevitable lengthy lawsuits because surely selection will fail often?
I have friends that insist that acupuncture and chiro-mancy are medicine and not magic. But when I visit a physician, I like to know they're credentialed and have passed through accredited institutions.