Beyond a very early point in any engineering effort (where fruit might be not just low-hanging, but actually lying on the ground), nearly everything is a trade-

Beyond a very early point in any engineering effort (where fruit might be not just low-hanging, but actually lying on the ground), nearly everything is a trade-off. Those trade-offs (higher fixed costs in exchange for lower marginal costs and higher quality) can be wildly beneficial overall but finding large Pareto improvements against every dimension is rare in anything even remotely mature.