It’s funny over the years I went from

1. I like being hands on keyboard and picking up a slice of work I can do by myself with a clean interface that others can use - a ticket taking code monkey.

2. I like being a team lead /architect where my vision can be larger than what I can do in 40 hours a week even if I hate the communication and coordination overhead of dealing with two or three other people

3. I love being able to do large projects by myself including dealing with the customer where the AI can do the grunt work I use to have to depend on ticket taking code monkeys to do.

Moral of the story: if you are a ticket taking “I codez real gud” developer - you are going to be screwed no matter how many b trees you can reverse on the whiteboard

Moral of your story.

Each and everyone of us is able to write their own story, and come up with their own 'Moral'.

Settling for less (if AI is a productivity booster, which is debatable) doesn't equal being screwed. There is wisdom in reaching your 'enough' point.