This is most likely a very American perspective. There are countries where you get paid like a normal employee (not much worse than an entry-level job) with unemployment benefits, building up pension, etc. and where you can focus on doing your research (only a lightweight teaching obligation).

I really treasure my (non-US) PhD time. I had a great adviser, was decently paid, and had a lot of time/opportunity to explore things, which I think lead to interesting research. And when I retire, it provides part of my pension. Also when I look back I often realize how relaxed my PhD time was compared to the much more stressful life after doing a PhD.

The field really changed after doing my PhD (I'm in NLP/CL and when I did my PhD, HPSG-like grammars and maxent models were still reigning), but I think I still benefit a lot from the methodologies I learned while doing my PhD.

I just completed my PhD at an American university, and I had a great time. Granted, my institution's stipend was on the higher side for the social sciences and I lived in an affordable city, which helped a lot, as did the kind and supportive faculty. I often feel the negative voices dominate discourse on this topic --- which is maybe fair given the many structural issues --- but it is possible, sometimes, to enjoy it.

(to clarify I'm not disagreeing with you, US academia does have lots of issues that lead to many having a bad time. But still, getting paid to learn is a dream)

Or the UK perspective where again it is becoming unaffordable to live on the striped, definitely so in London where I am doing my PhD.

Even in America I've seen similar opportunities. Engineering PhDs at state schools have offers where you get paid a small but livable amount and get your tuition paid for. I think the big difference is that in industry you can just get paid way more in America compared to engineering elsewhere.