It appears more people are getting the idea!
I halfway agree: it depends on how we’re discussing getting a PhD. If we’re talking about a transition to academic jobs in and of itself, things are better but not great in the sciences. The job market is still tight in those fields, and the slog to a tenure-track job is still long: 5-6 years of PhD work followed by 2-4 years of postdoctoral work, or even more. Many science PhDs are doing 2 or even 3 postdocs to be competitive for professor positions, and grad school + 2 postdocs means 3 different moves. It also means 7-10 years of low-paid labor - even if you are a bright-eyed 22-year-old when you begin, you’ll be 32 years old (at least) when you’re just starting on the tenure-track with a workable middle-class salary for a family.
Now, if we tell students these truths upfront and they use their time in the PhD program to prepare equally for academic jobs and non-academic possibilities…well, that’s fine. And many PhDs in the STEM fields - and even several social science fields; my field (psychology) is pretty widely useful outside of academia - have lucrative and ample possibilities open to them besides academia, if they do some research and find out about them.