All schools charge tuition, they don't pay tuition.
PHD paths usually pay for their own tuition, and a stipend in addition. You really do not know that?
All the top paying technical jobs require one or more certifications.
I wonder who is the top paid, the someone with a radiological technologist certificate, a medical doctor, or a engineer developing the next generation of diagnostic equipment... You are claiming it is the radiological technologist.
Seriously, any job that requires only certs is going to pay you at most $70 an hour, and will not give you any equity.
You just pivoted. Of course certs are useless to the person who has them. The employer is the one who demands them.
I have a low opinion of certs. Most of the employers I deal with are more cutting edge, and so have a low opinion of certs. They bring me in to help figure out whether the applicant is really qualified, and do not trust an online cert.
There was a time that some of the bonding companies were looking at certs, but now none of them do. I think certs will get you some licenses in healthcare, but outside of that I know of no licenses that a technical cert will get you.
1. A PhD shows you paid your tuition. It doesn't show that you learned anything.
You clearly have no idea how a PHD usually works. Usually, PHD students are doing research and teaching to get their PHD. It gives them academic experience, but also pays their tuition in full, and pays them a stipend to live on.
To get a PHD you have to do original research, and extend human knowledge. There is a PHD dissertation, along with a PHD dissertation defense. When hiring a new PHD, I always read the PHD dissertation, to get an idea of what sort of research they can do. A number from an online cert will not tell me anywhere near as much information.
2. People routinely lie about having PhDs
People lie about everything, but it is darn tough to get away with a lie about a PHD. You would have to somehow get a PHD dissertation into the archives, along with getting a full dissertation defense committee to go along with your lie. And the dissertation would have to be good enough to get a PHD... If you can write a good dissertation, and get a full dissertation defense committee to go along with it, why not just get the PHD?