It filters people into:
- those who don't manage time efficiently by investing too much energy on a problem.
- those who did cut the corner and as a result got an edge with a few more questions solved
- the genius ones, who solved everything, in whatever order
If the objective of a test is classifying candidates and time management is one of the metric considered, then this kind of testing pattern absolutely makes sense.
I was one of those who never cut corners and just focused on the problem at hand until failure, and now that I am working and need to get things done I wished my teachers trained me that skill.
People spent ages trying to find their mistake. I was one of the first to finish because I quickly concluded I wasn't going to find the mistake (after checking a mere 3 times).
I remember something similar on the LSAT. Odious practice; if you get a wicked problem in a professional context, you don't have the option of just blowing it off. Of course, you could say it's about learning to prioritize with limited resources, but that's meta-gaming the applicants and selecting for corner-cutters. There's a place for corner cutting; in emergency situations it's sometimes the right thing to do. The problem is that selecting for corner cutters also incentivizes exploiting the system for less noble motives.