Token Economy
Spend less, build more with the right model. Model routing & token economics for builders.
Why One Model for Everything Is the Most Expensive Habit in AI Coding
Using one frontier model at full power for every task quietly burns your AI budget. Here's the routing mindset that fixes it — and what it costs as of July 2026
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Reading the Meter: How Anthropic, OpenAI, and the API Actually Bill You
Two AI plans at the same price can cost wildly different amounts, because they meter differently. Here's how compute-hours, messages, and tokens each drain your
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Effort Levels Are a Budget Dial: When to Turn Reasoning Down
Every frontier model has a reasoning-effort dial, and most people leave it on max. Here's when high effort earns its cost and when it just burns your budget.
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Prompt Caching Is Free Money Most Builders Leave on the Table
Prompt caching cuts repeated input costs by roughly 90%, costs nothing in quality, and most builders never switch it on. Here's how it works and how to use it.
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Planning Models vs Coding Models: Don't Write Architecture With Your Code Model
Planning and coding are different jobs. Use a reasoning model to plan, a workhorse to build — and stop letting your code model guess the design and thrash.
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Build-a-Budget: A Personal Routing Policy for Solo Devs on Pro or Plus
Stop deciding model and effort from scratch every task. Here's a written routing policy — task type to model to effort — you can adopt today on a Pro or Plus pl
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Scaling Routing to a Team: Shared Policy, Guardrails, and Spend Governance
A personal routing policy evaporates the moment you hire. Here's how to make model routing a shared, funded, visible, enforced team discipline instead.
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The Do's and Don'ts of Switching Models Mid-Task
Routing means switching models — but a mid-task switch isn't free. Here's what's known about the hidden costs and the practical rules for switching cleanly.
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