But the description in your previous post does come off as elitist to me. You describe a class of license with immense electronics knowledge, etc., that most people will never attain. Everyone else who doesn't attain that knowledge must stay out of your portion of the band and never get the top license. That's an elitist attitude.
I certainly do respect your opinion, but disagree with the notion that some level of elitism (if that's what we must call it) is necessarily a bad thing. I've always believed that extra effort towards some goal is deserving of some extra reward, as opposed to those who choose to expend a lesser effort. Considering that one of the prime stated purposes of the very existence of amateur radio is a means of creating a pool of self-trained electronics experts, I don't think a set of spectrum-based incentives are out of line. If that's elitism, then so be it. I'm an elitist. *shrug*
If one REALLY wants to to something to help ham radio, though, I don't think extensive changes to the entry level and "elitist" level licenses are where one should direct their efforts. As I previously mentioned, if one takes a look at the HF spectrum, which is the ONLY place the various license classes differ in operating privileges, you'll see that it's the now obsolete Advanced class that has the lions share of "elite" HF voice spectrum.
Extras get 25 KHz at the very bottom of the non-WARC bands, CW only, 100 KHz voice band on 75 meters, and 75 KHz on 20 meters. That's it. An argument can be made that that lower 25 KHz is of little value to most newcomers because it is CW only, by international law. The FCC couldn't change it if they wanted to. That's 175 KHz of voice bandwidth, and 100 KHz of CW only bandwidth. 275 KHz total.
Now let's see what the advanced class has over Generals...
75 meters - 100 KHz voice
40 meters - 75 KHz voice
20 meters - 50 KHz voice
15 meters - 50 KHz voice
That's 275 KHz of phone bandwidth taken out of contention by an ever shrinking class of Advanced licensees.
If you listen to the HF bands on a busy weekend, the point of demarcation where it gets quiet is the boundary between the General and Advanced voice spectrum. That lower 25 KHz can get pretty busy with CW signals.
The top tier in our hobby should be attainable by all. There's absolutely no reason it shouldn't be.
I'm of the opinion that it IS obtainable by all, as evidenced by the people who buy a study guide and, any radios unseen, sit the test and walk in with nothing, and walk out an Extra. That doesn't fit the definition of something that's inherently unattainable. You want it? Work for it.
But I think this whole discussion is really moot, if a desire to make amateur radio more relevant is the real goal. The focus here seems to be on HF, but that's not where modern telecommunications is going. There's very little innovation taking place on HF. The technology is mature, for the most part. It's fun, but sitting in the basement exchanging signal reports with someone in severely broken English has limited appeal. Where interest is growing is things like DMR, ROIP protocols, 802.11-like mesh networking on the microwave bands, and so on, all of which is completely unaffected by any "class conflict" on the HF bands.
Aside from the growing disparity with the Advanced class HF spectrum, I don't think there's anything else wrong to be fixed.
Want to grow the hobby? The ARRL needs to turn it's focus away from HF, and more towards the technology trends occurring on the microwave bands. Start programs at elementary schools and help them build a school repeater on 220 or some other lightly used band. Visit existing CERT groups and put on programs that show the folks that are already licensed that there's intelligent life outside of the land of the orange vests.
And if any of them want to join me on the lower 25 KHz of 80 and 20 meters, on 35 wpm CW, they're more than welcomed to.