In C++ struct and class are the same except for default visibility rules. You could drop either keyword from the language and it wouldn't make any practical dif

In C++ struct and class are the same except for default visibility rules. You could drop either keyword from the language and it wouldn't make any practical difference outside of C compatibility. In GCed languages the default seems to be that every object is referred to by pointer. Java took the "ugly" step of adding in primitive types so you could calculate 1 + 1 without causing dozens of cache misses. Struct types take this hack a step further. It generally makes the definition of the languages virtual machine a lot uglier, for example most jvm instructions operate on primitive types.