Whenever there are scarce resources (and even in cases when they aren't), competition will exist. Even in countries where the average person is better educated than those in the United States, the competition only grows exponentially. Just take a look at the local acceptance rates for top-tier Korean universities.
Quality education isn’t scarce. You think Harvard educates better than most midwestern schools? No. You think MIT does? No. I have so many data points to validate that. So many people who went to both who can testify that for example UIUC was harder than MIT. The same with several other schools.
People go to the top brand name schools because of status, or because they think others care about the status. I’m not talking about trying to get a professorship. I’m talking about people who want a decent good job when they graduate.
On top of that, the number of high quality high schools, or decent quality that you can supplement with courses at your local college or online is massively high.
People are obsessed with metrics, often the wrong metrics, making them even more self-fulling prophesies.
In France for example they might have more funding for better high schools, but they also ban all kinds of things, like most rankings. Get people to stop obsessing and people will relax a bit and come out better. Again, this is for the majority, not the few who push society forward. Those people just obsess all the time.
I’m a programmer in Silicon Valley. I went to a “top” public school for computer science. I went to a no-name local high school in my home town. I see very little benefit to the school I went to. I have had bosses who didn’t even go to college. Others who studies English or something else entirely unrelated to CS from a school that wasn’t too in their field. What I’ve learned is those who keep learning rise to the top. Every year after college, less and less people care about where you went, what you majored in, etc. I haven’t had a single interviewer ask about my publications or research projects after my third year in industry.
Most parent just obsess way too much. I get it, I’m a parent too, but parents need to look at actual behavior that influences long term outcomes and whether those outcomes are even good.
In fact, one might argue that true mathematical CS degrees provide less preparation for many software jobs than a student with lab skills from a science degree like physics or biology, accounting and communication skills from business degrees, organizational and project skilss from an architectural degree, etc.
I agree that the difference between an ok school and a "top" school really isn't that much. Rankings are based on test scores, graduation rates and such which almost certainly select for good students more than good schools. When parents push their kids to certain schools, topping the rankings becomes a self-fulfilling prophecy. I can't find the study, but I had read a while back that getting accepted to top colleges was a better indicator of future success than actually attending.
If everybody had a Harvard degree, then it would lose its value.
Which is why they’re so adamant about not counting online degrees earned through EDX as “real degrees” because it would devalue their status signaling education.
I would argue we already have high quality education access. Go on YouTube, coursera or any other platform and you can find incredible resources.
What we don’t have a lot of is high paying/high status jobs, and as a result we’re put through a brutal tournament model, where one of the games consists of getting into a high-status college.