The Ph.D Bust: America's Awful Market for Young Scientists

Well, ok, so here's the thing: If you apply to grad school in one of the physical or life sciences and they don't offer you a TAship for your first year[1], then they are politely telling you to f*ck off. It's "generally understood" (which means that nobody knows this unless someone tells them) that any serious offer comes with a TAship that will just barely pay your rent in a crappy one-bedroom apartment with a little left over for food.

[1] And make wild promises about how everyone has a full RAship with ponies by his second year

practicing what was called "the mushroom theory of management." It was an old expression, used in many other corners of corporate America. The Eclipse Group's managers defined it as follows: "Put 'em in the dark, feed 'em shit, and watch 'em grow."

"For everyone else - look straight at industry" https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Mushroom_management

So be careful when you say "[reading these books will give you] more intellectual freedom afterwards than any PhD graduate." That's simply not true. And I'm not even touching on the benefits of having a good mentor...

I've chosen to do a PhD because I enjoy research and it gives me the time to learn a host of other skills too. I should have just turned 25 when I finish, all going well, with a whole bunch of stuff to add to my CV (not just papers, but the more intangible stuff too--going from a shy undergrad to someone who can present at international conferences, foster collaborations between different groups at different institutions, program relatively competently, use very delicate/expensive equipment responsibly etc.) Though it feels worth it to me it's also difficult to get perspective from "within" the PhD, so I'm asking anyone reading this from a more objective point of view: do you think it's all worth it? Or would it have been better to go into industry at the end of my undergrad? Obviously it varies from person to person, but I'm just trying to get a sense for where other people stand on this.

You do have a point, but the way I see true "intellectual freedom" (lolcraft may have meant somth similar) is that let's say you spend your late 20s-early 30s slaving away at a post-doc only to have a chance to access a "petaflop supercomputer" and then you suddenly decide that you actually are really interested in classical Persian poetry and you'd like to devote some time to learning Persian, only to realize you do not have time for that because hey, somebody needs to write those papers for the grant money to come in and your chances for tenure to remain intact.

Replace "Persian poetry" with the study of Mathematical logic, the reading of the pre-Socratics or trying to make sense of the early-medieval migration patterns, as things stand right now both the people following PhDs and those too immersed in industry are not "intellectual free" because they have no time for these sorts of intellectual pursuits. We do need to find that middle-ground between extreme-science and industry again, we do need universal people like Leonardo and Democritus back.