I bet that if they really wanted to try to maintain what they have while not basing it on race specifically they could just base it on zip code or poverty metri

I bet that if they really wanted to try to maintain what they have while not basing it on race specifically they could just base it on zip code or poverty metrics and still predict race correctly about 80-90% of the time. I'm not sure places like harvard want rich families to not be able to game the system, in some ways I think that's why they exist. I think rather it's closer to how pay-to-win mechanics work in games, if people can realistically earn what was paid for many will confuse their spending for skill, if it can only realistically be achieved via payment then it becomes a thing to mock because the only way it translates to success was by opening the wallet and there is no skill to be praised. By making an ambigious merit based system that can also be gamed by the wealthy it makes the wealthy seem they are entering due to merit rather than wealth, thus making it praisworthy while also meeting the needs of the wealthy, and in many ways I think that's the real point of most colleges.