At least in Sweden they are offering Youtube Premium lite which is just ad-free Youtube (no Youtube Music)for about $6/month.
That’s about the level I would pay for the service, a major bummer that lite isn’t available in the US.
No, if they introduced this tomorrow you still wouldn't pay. Don't kid yourself.
After you pay for the music rights for a subscription video service the cost base is identical. As you could use YouTube as a music streaming replacement service (and literally millions of people do) then the labels charge for the same license.