Ivy entrance rates back in the day were pretty generous and you could still get a solid thumb on the scale. The exams were hard, but they relied on knowledge of things like Greek and Latin and Classical Civilization that the working classes just didn’t have. Plus there’s that efficiency thing, people back then didn’t even think of applying if they weren’t already ‘in’.
There’s nothing I can add other than to reiterate @Corvos and @orthoxerox’s replies. Because classical systems still involve effective, consistent multigenerational meritocracy (ie social mobility), they effectively offer almost the same competence with a huge reduction in unnecessary make-work. Kids studying for 5 hours a day after school is worse for society than them spending that time digging ditches and filling them in; the latter at least involves exercise. Yes, you are impatient, but that is more about you than it is about society.
As for me, I have one correction to make. I’m not old money! I’ve said this before, but I was born upper middle class; my parents became truly rich only in my teens. My mother’s family were a mix of middle class for many decades. My father’s family were a mix of shtetl dwellers and Italian Jews who mostly arrived between the 1820s (early for Ashkenazim) and 1890s (with a few later outliers), and who went on to make and lose several fortunes, but who were at the time of his birth as middle class as you can get (think a small town accountant or government worker).
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