You bring up some interesting points. I certainly think that you can go overboard in the other direction, like in South Korea, where I'm not sure the crazy intensity of their educational system is necessarily better.

I still think there would be benefits to making education in the west a bit harder, if for anything to build the taste for intellectual effort in young kids. But especially to identify talent who could not be identified otherwise.

It's interesting that you mentioned Tao and Carlsen. Would they have been identified by the educational system had Tao's mom not been a mathematician, and Carlsen's dad a chess enthusiast?

More controversially, assuming "normal" parents, would Carlsen and Tao have had more chance of being identified and pushed towards excellence had they been born in the USSR in the 1950s or in the west today?

I think the "growth mindset" is the core problem. In the end it rewards highly motivated idiots, who get praised in spite of failing, while the genius who solves the problem in 10s gets dismissed as "smart, but lazy".