Wall of text due to mishmash of opinions and ideas... feel free to ignore:
My current interpretation of this poll is that people are just lazy. They want more stuff without working for it, and forget the whole reason why ham radio was there: it was allocated for experimentation, self learning - not free communication - free communication is incidental. People get excited when you hear hams ragchewing, well, this is incidental, not the intent. Obtaining that three way handshake (CQ, reply, CQ-reply) much like TCP was intended to be what one does on amateur bands. Ham bands are there because you cannot practice radio without radio waves, and if you produce a radio wave, you have the potential for interfering. Because of interference, you better know the rules and how to use the rules so that you don't interfere with other people. There's a reason spark gap transmitters were banned and I would expect as a ham you should be able to open a radio and at least verify that it's not a spark gap radio.
There's a significant number of responses indicating they want the exam harder, this is probably the "GET OFF MY LAWN" response, then again I thought the exam was too easy myself, as I one shot it all the way through the extra bits as well. Alas this only reduces the usage and hence increase "waste" of the bands making big business have even more reason to pressure FCC to release spectrum space from us.
Ultimately the reason for loss of interest in ham radio is because it's now so much easier to talk to someone by buying a cell phone or go over the internet. The three way handshake is hidden in the protocol. Don't need to worry about double keying, no worries about sunspots, F-layer, or gray line, and privacy is better. Only a few people in the world make radios and it's not worth it to study in a field that's so mass produced and saturated. Not only that, most people's noise floor in urban areas is so high that it's really hard anyway, and there's enough infrastructure that most populated areas you'll get a cellular signal, no problem. So why get a ham radio license? (A) When communications airtime costs money, (B) lack of infrastructure or destroyed infrastructure, or (C) you truly have an interest in radio technology. First two options are not truly the intent of ham radio! However all we can do to get interest is to focus on the those three options, and those really can't be "tested" on for interest in radio.
Unfortunately it ultimately sounds like most people just want to steal part of the ham bands to be used for "part 15 extended" or "part 95b extended" or "more ISM frequencies" because they don't want to get licensed... "Why does one need a license, this device is plug and play like a cell phone and cellular phones do not need a license." -- It's disappointing.
I'm not even sure the addition of STEM questions would help. Yes, the original intent of ham radio is propagation Science, radio Technology, antenna Engineering, electronics Mathematics. STEM people should already have no problems with the exams, no need to even change it. It's the non-STEM people who want more for less. Do we accommodate or should it be an issue if it were never the intent? (Then there's the Art of hiding antennas in flagpoles and fences for those STEAMers...again this is incidental and not the intent...)
How about another idea: what if the FCC increased the max wattage of a few CB channels, to say, 1500W, would people be happy with this? Note that these new "CBs" must be from the factory hardwired for only using these specific channels so they can't use the high power on the low power channels, much like the FRS/GMRS split? Let the cesspool become a legal cesspool...
