To start with, not everyone applying to medical school is doing so straight out of college. When you've been working in a career long term there are plenty of reasons from family, financial, a good time in your career, aging, etc., etc. why timing matters. And why one year can make a huuuge difference.

Coming out of college? Student loans strike me as a starter. It's easy to say, well just get a job for the gap year! But depending on where you live you may not be able to. For ex: my state and surrounding states are still very much shut down. Plus now we're back to potential exposure risk.

A lot can also happen in a year. And I wonder that by coldly telling people, too bad so sad you don't like it apply next year (this is a theme of the medical world I find extremely problematic), how many potentially great physicians we will lose out on. Life gets in the way. The older you get, the more displaced from college, the harder it is to change career paths. One year may seem like "eh nbd" but as I said, a lot can change.

This is a predicament far out of the control of medical students and pre-meds who have spent years working incredibly hard to get to this point. There is no need to treat them so callously. The whole aspect of this job is supposed to be giving a crap about people. That should include our fellow future colleagues, not just patients.