Perhaps in the end, Zoom, I am merely quibbling with you over terminology. What I can admit is that for the needs-blind policy to continue as it has in the past the University must be able to fund it. The bean counters must be alert to the effects of this as of every other policy at the U of C and must find the money to pay for it. JB says this more respectfully and precisely, but I put it that way because as I see it this particular policy, at least for all domestic applicants, comes first and is the given. It is sacrosanct at this University, and its deletion is virtually unthinkable. Whereas the means of giving effect to it are fungible.
It certainly helps and is perhaps not entirely serendipitous that in recent years the U of C has increasingly become a magnet for a certain kind of intellectually ambitious full-pay student whose parents would not previously have considered the undiluted cost of attendance at this institution to be justified by the education - or, to speak frankly, the value of the diploma - obtained therein. That is a significant change. There are undoubtedly many more full or nearly full payers now being admitted than there ever were in the past. This is not because the bar is being lowered to let them in. Rather there are simply more of them of higher quality who are also “Chicago types” than there ever were before. In a perfectly need-blind competition they will win most of the spots without anyone’s thumb needing to be placed on the scales on their behalf. The non-full-payers capable of winning spots in the competition will in part be funded by the full payers. That’s a happy outcome of needs-blind, not a defect. Other sources, including endowment funds, are also important. And, yes, someone has to make all this add up. There we are agreed.