The Price of Admission: How America's Ruling Class Buys Its Way into Elite Colleges--and Who Gets Left Outside the Gates

NATIONAL BESTSELLER • “A fire-breathing, righteous attack on the culture of superprivilege.”—Michael Wolff, author of the #1 New York Times bestseller Fire and Fury, in the New York Times Book Review

NOW WITH NEW REPORTING ON OPERATION VARSITY BLUES

In this explosive and prescient book, based on three years of investigative reporting, Pulitzer Prize winner Daniel Golden shatters the myth of an American meritocracy. Naming names, along with grades and test scores, Golden lays bare a corrupt system in which middle-class and working-class whites and Asian Americans are routinely passed over in favor of wealthy white students with lesser credentials—children of alumni, big donors, and celebrities. He reveals how a family donation got Jared Kushner into Harvard, and how colleges comply with Title IX by giving scholarships to rich women in “patrician sports” like horseback riding and crew.

With a riveting new chapter on Operation Varsity Blues, based on original reporting, The Price of Admission is a must-read—not only for parents and students with a personal stake in college admissions but also for those disturbed by the growing divide between ordinary and privileged Americans.

Praise for The Price of Admission

“A disturbing exposé of the influence that wealth and power still exert on admission to the nation’s most prestigious universities.”—The Washington Post

“Deserves to become a classic.”—The Economist