This summary of the US logic for top tier schools is totally inaccurate, by the way.
The very best schools in the US: to choose a relatively uncontroversial list, MIT, Stanford, Harvard, Princeton, Yale -- all have need blind admissions, meaning they assess your ability to come whether or not you need financial aid. At least some (like Harvard) have sliding tuition scales that make the school totally free if family income is under $100k a year, or room and board only for family income under $200k a year, with some support continuing for families that make more than 200k.
Students want to go to these schools because they offer class mobility in the states alongside the excellent education.
Additionally you have to go well down the list of top tier universities and colleges in America before you get to one that spends less than tuition on its students. Yale states they spend about $90k over tuition per undergraduate for instance.
I remember reading that while the admissions were theoretically blind, in practice a nicely stuffed list of high-brow extracurriculars would give away the upper class candidates and thus undermine all attempts for actual class mobility.
"Need blind" here just means that your ability to pay the fees doesn't factor into the admissions decision, not that the admissions office doesn't know how wealthy you are (...since as you note, this is often easily inferred).
In other words, you won't be refused an offer simply because the university thinks you can't afford it.
The point being made here is that while the university claims they don't factor in the applicant's ability to pay the fees, they also conveniently ask for information which helps them infer your social status, making their claim somewhat more difficult to take at face value.
Bear in mind this is a thread discussing how UK universities are claiming in the face of overwhelming evidence that they are not being influenced by foreign governments. So we should be able to accept that universities are capable of lying about their internal practices.
"So we should be able to accept that universities"
We absolutely should. As of now, universities tend to get away with practices that would be called out in the private sector. Entshittification of some services plus greed plus willingness to bend your morality around someone's golden glove (which hides a fist...).
> thus undermine all attempts for actual class mobility
Who exactly receives these class mobility benefits and who does not are at the center of a multi-decade culture war in the US, with lines drawn on all sides. It's definitely an open topic at schools, and the Supreme Court weighed in a few years ago on the matter.
I remember reading a slightly different version of this. That the extra-curricular part of the application was originally designed to reduce the number of successful Jewish applicants. Jews were historically excluded from many sports, clubs, and associations.
I don't doubt that it's been kept around for the reason you described though.
A lot of universities across the west seem to have cargo cult copied the Harvard application model. Harvard are doing it so it must be good.
I'm really not a fan of this. I'm from a part of the world where it's practically impossible to describe your extra-curricular activities without giving away your ethnic background.
The very best schools in the US: to choose a relatively uncontroversial list, MIT, Stanford, Harvard, Princeton, Yale -- all have need blind admissions, meaning they assess your ability to come whether or not you need financial aid. At least some (like Harvard) have sliding tuition scales that make the school totally free if family income is under $100k a year, or room and board only for family income under $200k a year, with some support continuing for families that make more than 200k.
Students want to go to these schools because they offer class mobility in the states alongside the excellent education.
Additionally you have to go well down the list of top tier universities and colleges in America before you get to one that spends less than tuition on its students. Yale states they spend about $90k over tuition per undergraduate for instance.