My first day at school was in 1958. With pop quizzes and weekly progress tests in all 5 classes I imagine we spent a cumulative 1 hour a day in testing. Without testing how do you know if a child is learning? I took a semester of college classes in 1997. Each class was four hours a week with the fourth hour spent in testing.
My exposure to today's education system is a daughter who teaches college English and a son in his junior year of college. From what I see even though actual education spending has doubled or even tripled over the last fifty years the education system in more about teachers pay and students rights with little thought given to actually educating the average student.
It seems like the US education system is following the US police and military systems in being totally out of control, self serving, and doing more harm than good while also being hideously expensive. The end of the world might not be televised but it will be online, I'll be watching.