I agree that quadratic equations are not part of the daily routine. I do like algebra, though, because it helps develop problem solving (in the general sense, not math sense). There may be other courses that require a certain amount of rigor and logical thinking, but algebra is pretty good at it. I like computer science training for the same reason... kids learn a lot by having to write a script to do something simple like navigate a maze, even if writing scripts to navigate mazes is not a day-to-day skill in high demand. I think algebra teaching could be improved since the logical thinking often goes away and rote application of formulae remains.