The largest barrier to entry to starting a new University is prestige. Accreditation is a challenge, but is doable. Gathering enough capital is a challenge, but is also doable. New institutions of higher education are started all the time. But when was the last time you saw a Harvard started?

Imagine the following thought experiment: the entire faulty of Harvard goes off and starts a new University (call it Garvard). Now, obviously, the quality of education at this new school is going to be just as good as Harvard. But which school are parents going to want their children to go to: old Harvard, with a newly hired crop of top professors, or Garvard, with the original professors? I suspect that Garvard would get less applicants, and would likely have to charge less.

This market force is why the cost of education is going up quickly while educator salaries are not rising as fast. In higher education right now, branding is more important than product.