[relkor]

I came away from the article feeling that the author missed the point of a PhD completely, at least for the hard sciences. When you complete a PhD, you have by definition extended the scope of human knowledge. You must conduct original research to get a PhD, its not just another couple of years of showing up to class. A PhD student will typically have 5-7 journal papers, a couple of conference presentations, perhaps a best paper, and an entire thesis by the time they get out.

That is a lot of proven work, ability, and expertise that very few other people on the planet have in your specific area.