That just can't happen, though. Part of tenure is having experience and being able to draw from that. It isn't just job experience, either: Life experience counts and can give your different ways to think outside of the box.

The best example I can give is art related: Documentaries and other non-art learning puts a variety of concepts and ideas in your brain, making it easier to think of creative concepts for artwork.

The process takes time, though, more time than can be reasonably stuffed into getting a degree.

The uni system couldn't afford to give tenured professors freedom to follow their fancy without the "underclass" working hard to make it possible in the first place — graduate students and untenured staff do the high-volume work needed to make profits: churning out tens of thousands of undergrads per year, paid for by fed-backed loans, and definitely not all of them taught by Feynman-type professors.

I don't know if that's true, that's just my model of how American university works.

Sure. I just wonder if there is some sort of middle ground? Does it have to be zero sum here between tenured and non-tenured in this regard? I'm not sure what the answer is but other setups are possible unless you consider this one optimal (perhaps some do!).