I am quite sympathetic with @edl1016’s point. Top universities in the US claim to meet “full need”. However, for a retired parent (who probably had their children when they were in their 40’s), or for a parent with a small business or rental properties, they really do not. You can’t sell your main large asset to put the kids through university when your main asset is also your main source of a moderate income. Also, if you are already retired, the money that you have sitting in a savings account looks a lot like “retirement funds”.
However, this really does not matter all that much. It must makes the famous “meets full need” schools irrelevant for some of us. Students can get a great education at other universities. We just need to find the schools where we can get a great education at an affordable price. Then our recent graduates can get a good career or get accepted to great graduate programs with degrees from universities that are not all that famous.