Is it intrinsic to this treasure trove that the knowledge it contains must be transmitted for pay, with exercises to be completed on a deadline, and with little choice on the learner's part as to what is learned?
And to say that the learner does not get to decide what they will research for their dissertation is just flat-out wrong. It is assumed that the student will pick what to write their dissertation on - they need to study it in-depth for 2-4 years and picking something that they do not find interesting will most likely lead to dissatisfaction (but it is still a choice).
Granted, a PhD program requires a prerequisite BS degree or equivalent which is generally not paid for and follows a typical regime. However, not all knowledge is the same - highly specialized "brink of human understanding" type learning is paid, unstructured and definitely has no exercises to complete (since the one learning them has the most understanding of the topic).
More importantly to your question, teaching a hard curriculum to a lot of students at the same time is a hard problem, and exercises with deadlines and relatively tight syllabus are a method that has been shown, for many years, to work for a large number of people. It certainly doesn't work for everyone, it certainly isn't the best way to learn, but it's an effective tool for the problem at hand.
I would have taken apprenticeship over college any day.
The University of Washington is $13,000 per year for residents, who are preferentially screened and rejected because tuition for in-state residents is too cheap.
UW costs $30,000/year for out-of-state residents who are more likely to be admitted since it's more than twice the cost.
By the way, the University of Washington is a public school. Private schools in the area start at $45,000/year.
There is literally nothing you can study in undergraduate school that would be worth that price. Not even close.
When I went there in 2003-2007 it was still a deal for the quality of education, and my degree was definitely worth what I paid for it (about $5,000-6,000/year) but the price has more than doubled since then.
If I had to choose a university at current prices I'd probably go to Western or WSU instead.
So I question whether or not the University of Washington is really a public institute in that regard.
Let's not even talk about what it costs to go to Seattle University or Gonzaga.