<p>You (the OP) are getting confused – as many people do – between Early Decision and Early Action. With Early Decision, students commit themselves to attending the ED school if they are accepted ED, and to withdrawing their other applications. Early Action entails no commitment to enroll if accepted, and an Early Action acceptee is free to apply to other colleges and to wait until the end of April to make his or her choice. The important difference is that an ED acceptee can’t compare scholarship/financial aid offers among various colleges, but an EA acceptee can.</p>
<p>Early Decision is often criticized as favoring the rich, because students who feel they need to compare financial aid offers often decide they can’t risk applying ED. As a result, the ED applicant pool tends to be much wealthier than the Regular Decision applicant pool. Colleges know that, and when they accept a big percentage of their class ED (it’s generally 33-50%), even the need-blind colleges know that portion of their class is going to cost a lot less in financial aid. And at colleges that award “merit” scholarships, there is a belief (often founded in reality) that ED students are less likely to get a big merit award, because the college does not have to compete to get them to enroll. The dynamic is completely different with EA. A student accepted EA can still choose a better offer elsewhere, so the college has every incentive to woo the student.</p>
<p>Early Decision programs are much more common than Early Action among highly selective schools. But the most [whatever] colleges – HYPSM – use EA, not ED. EA colleges get many more early applications than ED colleges do, precisely because it’s not such a gamble for the students. Hardly any ED private colleges get more than 3,000 early applications, and most get fewer than 2,000, while equivalent EA colleges like Chicago and Georgetown get 7-8,000 early applications. (HYPS only get 4-5,000 because they only allow their applicants to apply to one college early, while other EA schools allow multiple early applications.)</p>
<p>The foregoing is a little simplistic, and ignores some nuances that can be important when it comes time for you to submit actual applications. But it should clue you in to the basic difference between ED and EA.</p>
<p>As for deferral – all indications are that early applicants who are deferred get accepted at about the same rate that regular applicants are accepted. Which at the top schools is a very, very low rate, but not 0%. So deferral in an early round guarantees rejection about as much as applying in the regular cycle does.</p>