> Google is famously more selective than Harvard (both places have self-selected applicant pools, but Harvard admits 5% while Google has "millions" of applicati

> Google is famously more selective than Harvard (both places have self-selected applicant pools, but Harvard admits 5% while Google has "millions" of applications and only tens of thousands of programmers hired over multiple years) That is very debatable. You could argue that a large portion of high school grads in the world would be interested in going to Harvard, but they don't bother to apply because they know they have no chance of getting in. In contrast, one's chances of getting hired by Google aren't that easy to assess (there are no standardized tests for example) and also it's easier to apply, so proportionally way more people do IMO.