Earlier quoted context omitted.
Many of the reasons you point to are the result of guilds, which were very territorial about their workers and markets. What I am proposing is for apprenticeships to be democratized by being made available for any employer willing to accept the wage subsidy. So if you decide after 5 years that engineering sucks, you can always find an apprenticeship elsewhere (assuming your former employer doesn't give you a dreadful…
This is an interesting topic to brew on. There would certainly be a lot of problems that would be tough to address using apprenticeship, but it's not like our current education system is lacking in problems. I wonder, though, how apprentices would fair in competition with people having general education and degree focus. Fields require skills to change over time, and quite quickly now. I wonder if an apprentice would…
Trade Schools ditch the concept of a 4 year degree for a more affordable, focused alternative, but which doesn't entirely ditch the concept of an education (still requires high school, still puts you through basic requisite courses).
Because of the reduced time frame, they are also better matches for on-the-job training, meaning, lets say you decide you want to be an X, well, get hired by a company that does X, and have them directly subsidize your Trade School (you can get scholarships, but that's beside the point). You get a re-usable education, the employer gets a trained employee. If you decide your employer sucks, save a bit of money, and go another 2-3 years for a full fledged degree. Now you have work experience, and a completely re-usable degree.
This goes hand in hand with the second concept, Adult Education. Lets say, everyone gets hired to work at age 16, only they get on-the-job training in the form of an Apprenticeship. Require employers (by law, potentially subsidized by the state) to provide you with an education, as a part of your training. Don't just limit it to 16-21 year old's, though - education should be something available to everyone - no matter your age. Notice that this sounds a lot like the previous paragraph - that's because it is basically the same thing. Some companies do provide on the job training, but apprenticeships are rare, and so are Trade School/employer combos.
We should be combining the two.