The desire to avoid the "tan back stigma" of having to think to make money has already been satisfied by snooty literature. Snooty thinking is thinking that requires a smart brain but has no economic value. If you want to show that you're smart, and you also want to show that you don't need to make money, you can produce opinions on 13th century literature or whatever else you like. So, in a sense the author's prophecy has already come to pass.
Accusations of elitism from people who think they're better than everyone else are a weird feature of modern culture. I think it's somehow historically related to Calvinism (the best at being of service are the saved, not the best at being smart, or the best at asking questions.)
It's virtuous not to think too much, it means you aren't wasting time on things other than salvation (or making money.) Just do the obvious thing. Whatever everybody else is doing. Do it harder, though.
The worst existential accusation that anyone could levy against the intellectual elite would be that they're engaging in the conspicuous consumption of brain time, especially so given all the fun that's made of "McMansions" and other forms of conspicuous consumption. It's probably not true of everybody, but I wonder how many people would care about whether or not they were philistines if you took away any chance of getting recognized for having good culture.
