No! The main purpose here, especially from top-ranking schools, is to draw in a higher pool of applicants for two reasons that I’ve been informed of.
- To increase the size of the applicant pool with the same level of acceptance results in higher selectivity. Higher selectivity increases their rankings and public opinion as an "elite" school. They will send mailings to anyone regardless of admissions chances just to improve their selectivity. Invitation to reject.
- Those application fees don't hurt their wallet.