While I agree to your general sentiment, there are countries where apprenticeship systems work fairly well - Switzerland (full disclosure, I'm Swiss) is in my o

While I agree to your general sentiment, there are countries where apprenticeship systems work fairly well - Switzerland (full disclosure, I'm Swiss) is in my opinion one of those examples. At the age of around 14, you can choose to either proceed further with school or to get an apprenticeship. About 20% stay in school, 80% go the apprenticeship route. You still have usually two days of school during apprenticeship (with about 50-50 general education and education with focus on the kind of job you have chosen), and plenty of options to switch back to routes for higher education at any time.