No - of course folklore does not have to be ancient; why should the term 'less educated' be construed as such? Yes, we can still talk about less educated elements of civilised societies. I had a shitty secondary modern education and was told by a teacher a few months before I was due to leave school that all I needed to know on entering "the great big world of adulthood was how to tot up my wage packet at the end of the week". I really can't see that a great deal has changed for people of my background in the intervening period.
One of the greatest difficulties I have experienced as someone with an interest in a specialist subject is in being taken seriously by the 'better educated'. On a recent thread I was told that, rather than have my own experience taken seriously, it was preferreble that "some doctoral or post-doctoral research evidencing precisely how effective 'the process' is as a way of defining what's commonly described as folk music would be most welcome." It would appear that research is as 'class based' as I believe folklore to be.
I can find nowhere in any of the definitions I have looked up since you posted your question that a lore carrier 'can't possibly understand' what they are carrying - on the contrary, it is more often than not we outsiders who are incapable of understanding the reasoning behind much of what goes on, or is believed to go on in the communities we choose to work in.
Jim Carroll