gavra_at_work-
Its not only affinity, its also exposure. Without exposure, children will not be aware of the possibilities out there.
There is already exposure from the first eight years of schooling. This additional exposure would come at the expense of mandating three or four years of schooling in extremely difficult subjects. The only beneficiaries would be the students that were not interested in the subject beforehand but now would be interested. To compel everyone to put in an additional 3-4 years for this small group’s benefit isn’t reasonable.
This is not intended to minimize the importance of these subjects and their related professions.
Law, good government, crime prevention, and business management (just to pick a few examples) are also extremely important, but the courses needed for these professions are mostly not taught in High School.
In addition, for the yeshivish world, anything labeled an elective will be dismissed by rabbaim who will push for learning instead.
Not to get into this topic, but just a quick observation from my yeshiva days – “black hat” rabeim and roshei yeshiva don’t all have a monolithic “learning over anything, for everyone” approach. Although their lives revolve around the yeshiva, they aren’t oblivious to real-world requirements, as well as the fact that not everyone can learn all day.