I feel like the "I pay for this" merchandising of education mentality is bringing the true purpose of knowledge down.

I think it's really sad you feel treated like a number / customer. Education should be about creating and passing knowledge to people who feel both fulfilled by it and sense their contribution to knowledge is believed in. Some professors tend to see their students as "lower beings". I find this ridiculous, as I reckon once being sitting on their chair, willing to one day stand in front of the classroom, telling more students about the great stuff mankind has discovered for us to pursue discovering.

I believe it's great to rate your professors. My University makes rating and commentaries mandatory at the end of every semester, for every class. This both gives us feedback and make it possible to see what in the syllabus is worth keeping, and what is expendable. Just because you have been teaching something for years, it doesn't mean it's still relevant.

The one thing that makes me cringe are the "This class is difficult" or "There are too many articles to read". This is university. It's not supposed to be easy. I absolutely refuse to dumb down to make more people pass (don't get me wrong, very little people fail my classes, I don't let them). I truly believe that knowledge must be passed integrally and in the best possible way. Making a class easier for people to pass is a folly for society.

I don't teach "practical" courses, as I side on a very theoretical field, but if you think of it one second, would you like to think the engineer who designed that new bridge in your city "got it easy" in university? Would you like the professor teaching medical science to have given an "easy test" in order for your doctor to get better grades?

I don't know for other countries, but I believe the true challenge of our times for education is to make it fit the world we want to live in, not the market economy we have now.