When the average person who comes out of it can get themselves a living-wage job without loading up on debt for "higher education" in order to learn a marketabl

When the average person who comes out of it can get themselves a living-wage job without loading up on debt for "higher education" in order to learn a marketable skill? High schools used to concentrate on teaching young adults what they needed to know in order to survive independently. At some point they stopped doing that, perhaps because they're still trying to teach them to read. But that seems like a problem.