Clever code impresses in code review. Boring code survives production. Here's why the most experienced developers write the most unexciting code, and why you should too.
Quality
Discipline of AI output — over-engineering, lazy/boring code, file splitting, the junior-dev tax, and the cost of clever code.
The same over-engineering reflex that costs a team two days of junior time now costs you an hour of agent output, multiplied across every PR. The tax rate did not change. The volume did.
The agent's PR has six new files for one small feature. A utils file for one function. A types file for two interfaces. An index.ts that re-exports everything. None of it earns its keep.
Every junior dev I've met tries to build what already exists. Here's how the "laziest solution that works" mindset, backed by real code, makes you a better developer, faster.