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You raise a lot of good points, but I'd just like to comment on the "I can't for the life of me understand why you do this to yourself" part. I'm a postdoc in astronomy, and my situation is pretty good all things considered. But I think for many people their work becomes their identity, perhaps starting as early as childhood, and leaving is an enormous identity crisis. Going from being "the kid who has always loved space" to working on ad-tech or finance might as well be the same as changing your name, moving to France, and just hitting reset on your life. The "sunk cost" goes much further than just career skills.

The situation is actually very similar to what I've read from folks in game-dev. Almost one-to-one. And like you suggest, these sorts of situations probably all have their root in the supply/demand of labor imbalance from people choosing the career out of passion and being willing to sacrifice on many fronts for the opportunity to do it.