China also has an education system that’s supposed to be based on exam results, yet funny how the scions of high-level officials and billionaires usually end up at the most elite schools. Of course, it’s possible that they all got there on pure merit...
It’s usually just nepotism. I know a retired principal of an elite high school, and he’s full of stories of the shenanigans surrounding admissions. He would get calls from governors and mayors offering favors and applying pressure. He told me that half the buildings on the school campus were built as a result of accepting the children of high officials and rich businesspeople. In fact he once showed me a picture of the ornate gate of the school and said, “I call it the chicken gate, because it was the admission ticket of a kid whose family owned a chain of famous chicken restaurants.”
