Haha I empathize with this a lot. I frequently get some variant of “Why go be a professor; academia is a dying industry.” I have so many arguments. (i) no, only the Vannevar Bush American science funding model is dying—not academia, (ii) idk I think humans being able to think critically and do science is pretty vital to the future of humanity; if you want to help train the next generation of human scientists then academia is one of the best places to be, (iii) post AGI there will be an uptick in PhD demand, for people to engage in intellectual pursuits for funsies, (iv) there are many places to do good research; academia and industry. it just looks different in each place