^ Tied in to some of the above: The elite colleges discovered that demand for their education/degrees was a lot more inelastic than they had thought, which is tied in with growing inequality/growth in wealth of the top 1-5%.
^Agree Titan…the increasing disparity between rich and poor are making kids and parents so desperate they are willing to mortgage their lives on entry into the promised land. It is so sad. As you know by now i am very very jaundiced on the whole process, the “game” is rigged in favour of $$$$, from private schooling, tutors, private guidance consultants, ‘doctors’ notes etc etc., and actively encouraged by the colleges themselves. My particular favorite is the Sony exec who donated $1 mill to the Brown scholarship fund and hey presto the daughter is admitted. At the time I said to my colleague, a Brown grad, well Brown now we have established what you are, we are just haggling over price right?
ps. re Brown, the same could be said of the LSE who awarded Ghaddafi’s son a masters for something a Libyan academic ghost wrote in exchange for $$. I mention it in the interest of fairness, avarice does not respect international borders.