"in the UK and the US, PhD-students can in many (most?) cases choose their own topic" In the US, in the labs I am aware of, most of the student stipend for the

"in the UK and the US, PhD-students can in many (most?) cases choose their own topic" In the US, in the labs I am aware of, most of the student stipend for the experimental work is paid by the lab from its funds. As a consequence most of the time it is on the grant's topic. Choosing the lab is a way of choosing the range of the topics. "Our proposal would give PhD-students decent wage contracts for the research assistance or teaching which they would do" PhD students do not merely provide research assistance. They design protocols, carry them out and ask new questions, at least the good ones. The only thing that most PhD students lack is the ability to safely shift focus since most of their ideas have already been done but they don't know that since they are not aware of the literature. What I don't like about the articles on academics lately is that on the one side they are focusing on how to keep highly educated people with low salaries and on the other hand how to bring more people in academia. Increase the salaries and more smart people will come, it is as simple as that... instead they are trying to get more people in academia so more people get trapped by inertia in bad paying jobs...