Cha-Ching! Add it up!

Does anyone KNOW if you can claim b-school application fees on your tax return?

Here is an interesting observation. I tried to calculate the opportunity cost of human productivity spent on the exhaustive selection process for MBA programs. If we use HBS as an example and round out the numbers:

Total applicants: 9000;
Assumed average time spent per application: 50 hrs (includes essay rewrites, recommender selection and support, research, app form, interviews, prep etc. Correct me if you think I should adjust the estimate);
Total hours spent on applications: 450,000;

That comes down to 225 work YEARS of human productivity lost (at 40 hours of work per week and 50 work weeks per year) or an opportunity cost of about 4.5 productive human lives of prime talent - every year. ( 20-40 yr-olds with established education and active careers). In cash, at an average of $30 per hour pre-mba salary that equals to $13,500,000 USD.

For just one school!

All of this doesn't even include Admissions committee time to review and interview candidates, direct preparation process costs, or time spent on GMAT study!

Considering this breakdown, what is the opportunity cost of the entire application process at the top 100 schools? Shouldn't there be a way to simplify the process? What about asking candidates to donate 50 hours of pro-bono / charity work per school instead? Or setting up a single standard application for all schools... with maybe one custom essay per school? Just food for thought

rhyme, u make 300,000.00 a year and u still want to go for MBA? how much u expect yourself to make right after getting mba?