[lmeyerov]

Yes, weaker programs already do so. The faculty generally are top notch, and superstar students do seek out individual professors due to whatever alignment and succeed. So IMO it's more about the student, there are definitely places with different expectations already.

Likewise, in industry, it's not the hardest thing to get an r&d gig in say a hospital network or university as a research engineer supporting whatever lab(s). Basically a forever postdoc. Though salary may of course suffer.

One of the biggest things that comes out of a PhD is the ability to formulate and pursue open-ended problems. IMO that comes from (a) apprenticing and (b) repeated success/failure, both of which take time. So yes, you can stretch a PhD longer, or do a weak one and try to learn that later such as a postdoc. It's not hard to sniff out who has done the work / magically rocked it because they are magical / hasn't.