"The cost of college is a concern for many prospective students – and the expenses can take a toll even before classes start.
The price of the admissions process often totals hundreds of dollars when accounting for the costs associated with standardized tests, test-prep resources and application fees.
Among the 967 ranked colleges that reported their application fees for the fall 2016 entering class to U.S. News in an annual survey, the average was $43, and the most common fee was $50.
However, 50 colleges had application fees of $75 or higher, including many Ivy League schools and other highly ranked National Universities." …
https://www.usnews.com/education/best-colleges/the-short-list-college/articles/2017-10-10/50-colleges-with-the-highest-application-fees
There a few outliers but why shouldn’t Harvard, Stanford, Duke, etc. charge higher fees? There is a cost to the school for every application and they are flooded with apps with the high fees. Tulane chooses not to have a fee. That may gain them somes apps to have a larger pool. Supply and demand.
top 4 are:
Stanford University (CA) $90
Columbia University (NY) $85
Duke University (NC) $85
North Carolina State University—Raleigh $85
NCSU got 25.929 applicants in 2016. Difference in charging $85 vs $60 brings in an additional $650,000. And why would anyone who really wants to attend NCSU let a $25 difference lead to no application? Many of its applicants are applying to a total of 2 or 3 state schools, and a few hundred dollars is a drop in the bucket of college costs. ‘State-supported’ schools get 80% to 95% of budgets from tuition and endowment, and can rake in some extra money here with almost no downside. (My D applied only to NCSU and UNC-W EA, accepted to both, and we were done).
A different story for the senior applying to 10 LACs, comparing fin aid packages, and happy to see no application fees from a bunch of fine schools.