> The scary part is that codebases are getting layers of AI complexity, that it's going to cost $$$ to have the latest model decipher

Isn't this a bit like old Java or IDE-heavy languages like old Java/C#? If you tried to make Android apps back in the early days, you HAD to use an IDE, writing the ridicolous amount of boilerplate you had to write to display a "Hello Word" alert after clicking a button was soul destroying.