During my PhD studies, most students I talked to were aware of the lack of professorships available. The issue, however, was that certain departments/professors really frowned upon PhD students exploring jobs in industry (some departments were great though). I was in engineering and the professors were generally helpful with trying to connect you to people they knew in industry. Departments like Psychology were the opposite though. Some students would search for industry jobs without telling their advisor because they feared they would be ignored and not supported throughout the rest of their PhD if they said they were going into industry. Some of the tenured professors only cared about increasing the number of academics who studied in their lab. They didn't care much about whether the students were happy or were following their interests.
I agree with most of this. However, I might take issue with the motivation you ascribe to professors: "only car[ing] about increasing the number of academics who studied in their lab." Another explanation, one that I find myself feeling sometimes, is simply mismatched incentives. Practicing academics and students headed to industry simply have different incentives, and that can add friction to the relationship.
I think it would be helpful and useful for departments to consider other ways to facilitate industry pathways that don't so heavily rely on the advisor.
I get what you are saying, but the incentives do not have to be misaligned. It makes total sense for both the professor and student to be aligned in pursuing the goal of completing and publishing interesting and original research. It shouldn't matter what the student does after completing said research! But, some professors distribute their resources unequally and give the most time/money to the students who are trying to become professors.
