AI leverage and top engineers — where does this land?

Options

• It democratizes building: more people can ship, and that is mostly a good thing for the industry.
• It multiplies the best people disproportionately — the gap at the top will feel brutal.
• Both: the median rises, but the ceiling explodes and teams reorganize around a few leverage points.
• Middle layers get hollowed out; you either orchestrate systems or you execute tickets.
• Titles matter less; observable judgment under uncertainty matters more.
• Companies will pay for taste, product sense, and accountability — not typing speed.
• Junior pipelines break unless mentors force real understanding, not paste-only workflows.
• It is too early to tell — we are still measuring the wrong things everywhere.
• Equality was always a myth in engineering; AI just makes the myth harder to maintain politely.