I don't think it's much of a paradox that people who excel at memorization and taking tests (and choose to pursue such a demanding test and work on it for year

I don't think it's much of a paradox that people who excel at memorization and taking tests (and choose to pursue such a demanding test and work on it for years) are not that good at doing actual meaningful work afterwards. I'd venture that a lot of effective, hard-working, achieving people would simply not spend so much time and energy on such a test. Given the amount of memorization involved, it probably discriminates for people with a faith and trust in the established system, more like ineffective bureaucrats than reformers.