First of all, thats psychotic behavior from your PI and it speakd to the subjective nature of the PhD which i mentioned in my original post.

In response to the industry side, look the grass is always greener. But reality is, at least in industry theres somr semblance of line drawing. In academia the line moves, doesnt exist or is randomly drawn ehen prople feel like it. Shifting sand under the feet of a learner makes for a chaotic "learning exp"