The PhD issue sounds like it's about gaming a system: merely trying to maximize yields from hard studying, assuming that the degrees have, or ought to have, an

The PhD issue sounds like it's about gaming a system: merely trying to maximize yields from hard studying, assuming that the degrees have, or ought to have, an intrinsic value, and that value had better be somehow reflected economically and on the job/career markets. It's all talked about as if there was some absolute value of a PhD that works the same for everyone. That there was a thing that would unilaterally be a good choice for just anyone who only can take it and carry it out. But, in reality, the world has a different world for everyone. In the real world, the valuations of events and choices and lessons aren't apparent, until perhaps later. The valuations don't necessarily come in terms of mere financial survival, like getting a job or getting more money. It's all dependent on the time, the place, the person, and the circumstances leading to the choices made and the lessons learned from them. For example, for one man it might be absolutely golden to first start a PhD, then end up flunking out, internalize some of the facts of his life, and finally end up doing something different, something that is him even if it's not highly regarded in the careerwise or otherwise, in how we like to define "success". Yet, for another man, starting a PhD, finishing it, getting a top job, building a top-notch career for ten years might, in the scope of his life, be the worst possible choice that merely helped him to spend 15 years avoiding ever being challenged in his life's weak spots. The former man has gone somewhere, the latter man has gone nowhere. A PhD is can be perfect if you can channel your life, your self and your creativity through it. A PhD can be worthless if you just do it for the sake of the degree.