You’re getting mad at Cursor’s and Claud Code's pricing like someone put a toll booth on your IDE. What's actually happening is that you’ve got under your hands the best developer assistant that’s ever existed. It’s a supercharged partner in the trenches—and yes, it costs more than your Netflix subscription. That’s not greed; that’s real infrastructure.

I compare this to internal combustion engines. At the turn of the 20th century, these little powerhouses didn’t just replace horses—they powered lawn mowers, mills, chainsaws, generators—machines humans used to push, pull, pedal, or haul. Suddenly manual labor didn’t scale; horsepower did. Same deal now: AI is that tiny yet mighty engine driving your codebase at 10x speed.

Let me be clear: GPUs, servers, and bandwidth are a massive expense. These companies have been eating costs to build adoption, but now the tab’s due. Running inference at scale burns cash faster than streaming HD video for 10,000 users. So no—they’re not price-gouging over your hobby project. They’re paying real bills, expecting real returns.

These aren’t gadgets. Think of Cursor as the equivalent of a mechanic’s diagnostic rig. Ask any auto shop. No one bats an eye at paying for tools that earn bills. You plug in the thing and charge $100. 15 minutes. Want AI that predicts, scaffolds, debugs, and refactors? That’s industrial‑grade. Not a toy.

Cursor isn’t brag-ware. It’s sharp. It tracks context across files, suggests improvements, helps you think modularly. That’s time recaptured—not minutes, but hours. If you’re billing even $50/hr, a few hours saved = profit, not cost.

And here’s the beauty—use Claude Code for whiteboard-level design, switch to Cursor for build-and-tinker execution. They’re complementary. Pros don’t duel tools—they stack them. You use a chainsaw and a wood-chipper together. Use the right engine for the job.

In the early 1900s blacksmiths ignored cars. Meanwhile engine-mechanics took over cities. If your mindset is “I just sharpen my hacks,” guess what—you’re still shining horseshoes and oiling saddles. AI is the combustion engine of software now.

So stop whining about “too expensive.” Because it’s not expensive—it’s exponential. You either pay in cash for pro tools or burn cycles (time, stress, debugging). This isn’t subscription—it’s strategic investment. The value it provides is amazing.