What productivity gains should go to the workers? I'm happy to collect my current salary + the usual raises to date, in exchange for transitioning my job to increasing amounts of AI use if required. If I lived like people in the 1970s I could have retired after 10-20 years in the industry, easily. Sooner if I prioritized money. My standard of living has grown immensely to the current level which I'm happy to maintain. I formerly shared a 3 bedroom leaky house with 5 dudes by the train tracks.

Do the productivity gains from stack overflow "belong" to the workers? Do the productivity gains from better google search or wikipedia? If I want to charge by the product instead of hour - I can leave and start consulting or contracting.

How should those productivity gains go to employees? I own equity in this company, and most others I have formerly worked for. I have free access to public equity markets, tax subsidized 401k and IRA plans which have historically enriched 100s of millions.

I've been through layoffs where I didn't have to take a day of reduced salary or unemployment because of severances nor did I experience a single day of health care coverage lapse b/c of same, or b/c of spouse's insurance or public marketplace.

My situation is not unique to software engineers in the USA. The public market, cheap/subsidized retirement plans + equity bonuses have effectively seized a good portion of the means of production for the workers, allowing consistent enrichment from expansion of industry. And corporate america for all it's evils has produced the entirety of the social safety net that I've used after I graduated, and that is while changing jobs basically whenever I wanted (plus one time I didn't)

Guys, I don't see it yet. Maybe I'm dumb, but it's not here yet and there is a case to be optimistic that everyone is ignoring. Prepare for the worst, but once prepared, banish it from your mind.