It’s not just legacies who get preferential treatment. In The Price of Admission, journalist Daniel Golden estimates that at elite schools, minorities make up 10% to 15% of students; recruited athletes, 10% to 25%; legacies, 10% to 25%; children of people who are likely to become generous donors, 2% to 5%; children of celebrities and politicians, 1% to 2%; and children of faculty, 1% to 3%. If you take the middle figure in each of those ranges, you’re looking at as many as 55% of students who were probably given special consideration at admissions.