Some years ago, in New York, I had a student who disliked me because I was the only teacher who didn't give him straights A's. He was above average, but in that school district, average was extremely low. Because those grades had given him an inflated image of himself, he applied for admission to Harvard, Yale and Princeton. He was turned down by all three, and it broke his heart. I know several.
Inflated grades are a lie.
They hurt students. We need to flunk kids who don't make the grade. All we have to do is flunk them once, show them we will not back down and most kids will do the required work to improve. Most don't do the work because they don't have to. That figure is the published propaganda of school administrations who include all kinds of special teachers with tiny or even no classes to bring down the ratio and make it look good.