Do grad students have any leverage over their advisors? Surely there must be some incentive to root out professors that degrade the reputation of the school. Public shame? Accusations of fraud? There are more options here than students admit, and some other school would have loved to have you.
Part of the thing to keep in mind is that things like accusations of fraud are potentially career ending.
People, including professors, understandably react poorly to other people trying to end their careers. It's important to recognize that something like that is coming out swinging.
Also, in my experience, there's a tendency with many graduate students to conflate "unethical" with "I don't like this". Not saying that's true in this case, but an "incentive to root out professors" is likely going to result in some pretty strong undesirable outcomes as well.
My mentees failing to progress will show up on my annual evaluation, and will certainly be a factor in my tenure case (especially since my position has no other aspect for teaching).
It's also something the project officers on my grants watch.
It also means I lose whatever I've invested in that student.
One does not idly destroy their graduate students, regardless of what HN occasionally thinks.
No, graduate students in general have no leverage over their advisors. A single word from your advisor and you're out of the field.
There is little incentive to root out professors for any reason. The process of becoming a professor (grad school -> postdoc (N times) -> tenure track faculty -> tenured professor) is generally believed (by tenured professors, of course) to root out anyone unworthy of the position. You can believe what you want about the efficiency of such a process.
Public shame requires public understanding of scientific (mal)practice, so, good luck communicating that. Most of the time, the bad actors in question have already gotten papers past referees; what makes you think the public is capable of more thorough review?
Fraud is considered a serious allegation and as a result accusing someone of it requires going through a thorough process involving a host of university administrators, whose incentives are aligned with the profit motives of the university system.
Transferring graduate schools is essentially impossible, and even in the exceptionally rare circumstances that it happens, it always involves burnt bridges and often has to do with bigger fish (i.e. your advisor being offered a position elsewhere, and you're lucky enough they take you with them.) Without external funding to support you, you are usually replaceable. All graduate departments receive applications far in excess of the number of students they can support. They certainly will not consider taking on another from a school at which you've proven to be a problem. Academia has already established a quite successful leaky pipeline; the beginning (graduate school) is no different.
In academia, hierarchy is the rule, flat organizations the exception. You must purchase your influence, usually at significant cost (and luck is a significant component). As an undergraduate, the system is designed to cater to your interests; as a graduate student, you cater to the university's interests. Scientific integrity is a noble notion, and in some corners of academia, it survives, but it does so in spite of bad actors who thrive in a system designed to produce ten times the number of qualified applicants for each job, all of whom are judged according to easily gamed metrics. It would be nice if things weren't this way.
But the problem is, typically... if you decide to get a PhD in science, it is possible that you're already too obsessed with the subject to ever, truly, give it up, especially if it's "just" over working conditions. I can't speak for everyone, but most people leave because they were forced to.
