Well, the number of applicants to medical school has steadily risen every year. My personal view is that because more people are attending college then more people will apply to professional schools (medicine included). The rise in college students is mostly because of the cultural shift and also the recent recession that started in about 2007/2008. People realize that doctors have a "recession proof" job and some are attempting to get a job like that (Granted I don't think this is the main reason for the increase in applicants). A 4 year degree started in 2008 puts them at applying in 2012 for the 2013 medical school year.
If these last two things are true, then it will just keep getting worse. However, once the unemployment rate decreases to a much lower rate, there may be a slight decrease in people applying to medical school four years after. Make no mistake, the number of applicants to medical school will still rise year after year because of the increased number of people going to college.
Whether or not those people apply early is a mystery. I will assume the applicants would be uniformly distributed in the submission time, but the advent of the internet and creation of forums like SDN have taught people to apply sooner. With rolling admissions, that is just common sense.
