yes, that's the general idea, no? Further studies funded by the government. Pushing the boundaries of knowledge is expensive but critical for any country that wants to remain influential in the world.

Regarding employment rates, I can't speak too broadly on that as I'm more focused on the econ field, which does not have employment issues. But I would be interested in hearing the base for you numbers.

in the case of a humanities PhD, yeah. It's probably easier to become a pro-athlete than find the handful of jobs that require a history PhD. But a chemistry PhD? Engineering PhD... agricultural sciences... geology... the job search is still a search, but these aren't degrees that have no demand. You certainly are more likely to find industry jobs vs. academic jobs with many hard science degrees. The return on taxpayer investment is sensible compared to other taxpayer funded schemes (in my view, if we're going to be a country that also funds primary and high school). and this investment is not a direct funding of PhD students, but funding projects they carry out, which in most cases is in national interest. The select number of students working on completely useless projects that are ideological dogma are definitely making the rest of higher education look useless.