My alma mater has had to shorten its semester by something like four or five weeks since I was there, due to state-level austerity. This kind of thing has become normal at public universities across the USA, so your "cheap" (ie: ~$14k/year) in-state tuition is now buying strictly less education. Research is centralizing to the most elite institutions, or going abroad. There was a government shutdown in 2013 that literally cut off the flow of already awarded NSF funding into academic coffers.

Meanwhile, Canada considers $10k/year for tuition to be expensive, and hasn't cut everything to the bone. Australia and New Zealand are similar. Parts of Continental Europe have dirt-cheap degree programs (on the order of $5k/year, even for foreigners), some of which are conducted in English, and others of which require you to speak the language.

If you do take a high-quality degree abroad, you can either subsequently apply for a work permit and enjoy better basic labor provisions than you'd usually get in the United States (cheap health-care and lengthy vacations as defaults), or come back to work at a high-paying American job if you can get one. It's a more diversified portfolio, you could say.

This has gotten to be a serious rot, like mushrooms growing out of a dead tree. The USA has gotten too used to importing its STEM professionals by brain-draining countries who seriously invest in education, and itself radically under-investigating in both STEM professionals and skilled tradespeople. You can't run a First World economy on nothing but low-level laborers, asset managers, and business owners.

I mean, sure, if someone has to do the real work but nobody does the real education, that probably means that us personally who got educated and trained in the "good old days" will have more bargaining power for salaries, but we'll also face a "hole" in the labor market of suitable juniors to train.