How important are the MIT essays?

MITPhysicsAlum
Sun, 08 Jan 2017 12:58:44 +0000

I’m with HPuck35 - MIT says “important” and has given no reason to doubt this.

Superbowser12 makes an interesting point. Reading these takes something like 10,000 hours. At $50/hr (minimum), that means they are spending at least half a million dollars on essays. Why would they do this if it weren’t important?