Maybe it is a self correcting problem. Perhaps the moment Elsevier is so out of vogue that you can’t find a library or peer at another university with access is also the inflection point where Elsevier loses its network effect. Why would you license your work to a journal for which your peers and their institutions have no direct access?
First of all, piracy is a workaround and not a legitimate solution to any problem. Second, it doesn't solve the root issue here--somebody has to have paid the inflated cost of an Elsevier subscription. Sci-hub doesn't exist in a vacuum.
piracy is a workaround and not a legitimate solution
Why not?
Piracy is a problem for content generation because somebody needs to get paid to generate the content. Elsevier does not generate content, it's a (parasitic?) gatekeeper using network effects to extract rents.
If content generation would be healthier and more vibrant without Elsevier, then piracy seems an appropriate and just solution. I don't see content creators lining up to defend Elsevier; quite the opposite.
(It's possible that someone could argue that Elsevier adds significant value for their cut, but I haven't heard anyone make that claim)
Why is it not a legitimate solution? Sometimes laws fail to catch up with technology, and copyright is a good example of that. Copyright law is based on the assumption that mass distribution is an industrial activity; today mass distribution can be done by ordinary people using common tools that we carry in our pockets.
I get the idea that skirting the law is not something we should generally encourage as the solution, but let's not get carried away and act like copyrights are some divine commandment and grad students using scihub are a bunch of evildoers.
Surely, you see the problem here?