I also see a bunch of skills emerging. First if you're doing frontend type dev, there is a lot of value in good aesthetics and UX intuition. You can build hundreds of prototypes and test concepts much better.

On the backend, while LLMs can trace race conditions, the need to reason against spaghetti and figure out what your context window looks like is still very much there. Designing tests that ensure seamless migrations still requires a degree of human oversight.

Then there are frontiers like robotics where even with LLMs coding, there are so many cross functional problems that you dont feel like you are moving faster.

I work in a fairly niche role. I use llms for coding all day but there are times for the type of operations research work I do I simply find it easier to write algorithms in almost correct code.

While they maintained control over those, they engaged in war and looting against the established Spanish empire. They managed to entice the Indian elite by being extremely effective at paying back loans using the loot they got during the Spanish era. Internal division among elite in India meant that the bankers in bengal thought they could use the British for deposing a king they did not like and at the same time handle the raids that the Marathas were performing. The British essentially used the money to bribe the king's army and took control of Bengal (which was the ricebasket for one of the largest empires of the time and the largest cloth producer). Unfortunately for said bankers, once the British took control of bengal they betrayed the bankers who lent them money. They raised an army of local sepoys and went on to take the rest of the subcontinent (although this was a slow painful process).

Even as the US revolted and gained independence, the British found themselves with a growing colony in India where civil wars and divisions between kings made it easy for the British to move in. One thing to remember is that when we talk of a British army at this point it really is an army where the lower ranks are made of Indians who were trying to make a living (as it turns out British were just better paymasters than their local counterparts).

Once they conquered India, they moved east and use Indian soldiers to take on Chinese while waging the opium war (and making a tonne of money from the trade of drugs).

Ive glossed over a bunch of things but honestly the success of the British in the 1800s is built over many many years of multiple investments some of which started in the 1500s (for instance their acquisition of Mumbai was entirely by sheer dumb luck as it was part of a dowry given by the Portuguese, who in turn received it as part of a peace treaty with a local ruler)... Many of the things that brought them success was a result of fairly immoral behaviour. And while their governing class in Europe is fairly small they had massive local administrations run by locals reporting to them.

Similarly if your were to look into food delivery companies/ridehailing you would also find many countries where Uber has completely failed.

If AI is somehow able to prove everything wouldn't it bypass Godel's incompleteness theorems?

What is going to suck though is the ladder for juniors. We dont start out by working on big ticket problems, but usually early career researchers solve really tiny problems in a cheap way. The lowest bar for a cash strapped PhD student would be to contribute to some new theory in some way even if the student doesnt have access to equipment.

Also the "Your manager or your tech lead could finish those in much less time and with much less hassle than it takes to help you through them." suggests that he is not hiring talented juniors.

It is also a good senior dev's job to architect and scope tasks so that juniors dont bring the whole system crashing down.

Im of Indian origin, I have lived in India. I also have lived in both China and now call SG home.

Re your point about "somewhat functional court system" and government land acquisition.

In Singapore when the government wants to acquire private estates a vote is held locally against an offer. The offers are extremely generous and hence it is rare for votes not to fall through. The government is also able to actually pay its citizens.

In India we had local political goons threaten to come in and takeover my relative's home since it was not occupied. We could open a court case, but when will it be heard? 50 years from now? Yes the home was in a tier 3 city but still, which is more fair/democratic?

This is in stark contrast to a place like India where pulling up bulldozers to solve problems is becoming increasingly common. Politicians will command building of infrastructure just to satisfy voters without thinking through long term consequences. Often you get projects which exist just to check of the fact that they have built something even if that thing is utterly useless once complete.

Err...My point being that it's not like Biharis who move to West Bengal and Tamil Nadu are welcomed with open arms. West Bengal itself is a masterclass in what happens when you dont industrialise and implement birth control policies.

> Coming to main topic, much of West doesn't have fiscal runway. But your point about getting old before getting rich is valid. But it is not all bad news.

If USA's quality of life reduces people can still expect to live better lives than they do in India.

>IMHO one of main challenges for a democracy like India is, planning just about anything that involves land, capital takes just as long as in, say, US or UK due to lots of consensus building, "activism" delays, lawsuits etc. And by the time the thing is built - be it airports, roads, sewage pipes or water treatment etc., the population is far far higher. And it turns out inadequate almost like back to square 1.

Do you think China and Singapore just build like that? If you do you're kinda wrong. A LOT of time is put into planning and gaining consensus. Yes, the means aren't the same as India or USA, but Singapore for instance regularly holds ground level consultation with many people from different walks of life. Strong manning things leads to worse outcomes and both China and Singapore know this and only exercise it when absolutely necessary. The real issue is competent leadership. In most parts of the world only the most undesirable enter politics. It seems like the take away Indians and Americans have at looking at Singapore and China is StrongMan=Good without realising that it was a democracy that placed man on the moon, invented computing and more. The success of China and Singapore is predicated on their leadership and excellent civil service.

Ironically, the highest birth rates globally occur where economic security is non-existent, a state of living none of us want to return to. What is truly worrisome about a country like India is that it is facing sub-replacement fertility before fully industrializing. In states with highly unique identities like Tamil Nadu and West Bengal, the native population has already fallen well below the 2.1 replacement mark. While internal migration from higher-fertility northern states fills the gap, it creates significant political and cultural friction.

In developed countries, the state can at least leverage accumulated wealth to bankroll healthcare and social services required by a rapidly aging population. In a developing nation like India, they risk growing old before they grow rich, leaving an aging population without the robust safety nets or fiscal runway of the West- we might even see the country slide backwards into sub-saharan African levels of poverty