While we haven't heard any statistics for the past couple of years, graduate students used to estimate the ``payoff'' using the starting salaries of Ph.D. and M.S. positions, the average time required to obtain a Ph.D., the value of stock options, and current return on investments. For a period of at least five years that we know, the payoff was clearly negative. Suffice it to say that one must choose research because one loves it; a Ph.D. is not the optimum road to wealth.
Academia has never been a way to make a lot of money, but, until ~1975 (https://jakeseliger.com/2010/01/21/problems-in-the-academy-l...), one could reasonably expect to eventually attain a reasonable material quality of life while pursuing ideas, the life of the mind, and so on. It could be reasonable to sacrifice 5+ years with the expectation that one would get that reasonable material quality of life after, while advancing human knowledge, etc.
The problem is that today the more likely outcome (there are exceptions, some of them posting in this thread) is that one has wasted 5+ years in, at best, advancing someone else's career.
"I love research" is too often a way for institutions and professors to exploit the young.
NOT… A way to make more money
While we haven't heard any statistics for the past couple of years, graduate students used to estimate the ``payoff'' using the starting salaries of Ph.D. and M.S. positions, the average time required to obtain a Ph.D., the value of stock options, and current return on investments. For a period of at least five years that we know, the payoff was clearly negative. Suffice it to say that one must choose research because one loves it; a Ph.D. is not the optimum road to wealth.