I don't fully agree with your post, but you do make some good points. In The Netherlands I have seen some majors go downhill (hello psychology!), while others became a bit tougher actually (hello computer science!).

In the Netherlands though, what I've noticed is that high school was tough (if you did STEM high school that is). IMO, high school was way tougher than university, considering the skills you had at the time and effort you needed to put in.

Even computer science is a cake walk compared to that, because at university people tend to be more motivated than in high school.