Are graduate students exploited?

The article mentionned in the previous post has raised a lot of controversy around here. First off a bunch of students have complained to the dean of graduate studies about Valerie Wallace's comment that PIs employ an army of graduate student because they are cheap. Some have taken offense at this as it implies that we are no more than cheap labour. Then this morning we received a letter from the director of the OHRI, basically apologising if anyone had taken offense, and stating that this quote was taken out of context. But then he adds that we do science for the love of it and basically that we shouldn't bite the hand that feeds us. I wont publish the letter because it isn't public, but that's the general idea. We also know that some guidelines will be implemented regarding the salary scales which will be made public. Unfortunately those remain guidelines and wont be inforced. What do students think about all this? I have been listening around the lab to get the answer. First off today is a holiday across the OHRI but students aren't alowed to take the day off which may add to the general negative feeling. I think the consensus is that graduate students should make at least minimum wage and that most of us are struggling because we live often away from home, we have to pay tuition and we get on average around $17K. If we do get a scholarship it doesn't get "added" to our salary it just saves money for our PI. Considering graduate students are indeed the ones carrying the bulk of the research, shouldn't they be valued more? What is our worth to society? For the average person in the street it would come as a surprise that we make such little money considering the education level and sheer amount of work done. Then again what we produce has very little monetary value on average, especially in the short term. Do the products of my research have the economic worth of the scholarship I have received from public money? Is it better to pay a few graduate students a lot or pay little money to a lot of people? At the end of the day, if people are willing to do the work things aren't likely to change. Indeed the love for science is a poweful thing, but it doesn't buy us rent, and smart poeple are turned off research because they don't want to be poor for the rest of their lives. I personally feel very fortunate of my condition but find it depressing that my friends fresh out of school in business or engineering make more money then I will ever with a phD. And to even have a chance at making it we need an unreasonable amount of productivity. No wonder that some desperate scientist resort to cheating. I want to know what you think is a reasonable pay or what you think of this controversy in the comments section ...