Civic Innovations

The cost of generating software code is collapsing, and governments aren’t ready for what that means

If I could single out one trend from the past twelve months in software development for people in government to watch closely, it would be this.

AI coding assistants have reached a level of maturity that makes them a genuinely viable tool for developing and managing software systems – even large and complex ones.

Things are changing very fast, and it’s easy to get lost in the details, the lingo, and the hype. But the bottom line is really straightforward. AI tools are getting dramatically better at producing quality code, and software teams are gaining far greater control over that output. The cost of generating code is falling, and this trend is very likely to continue apace.

This matters for government because so many of the problems governments face with digital solutions trace back to how expensive software has been to build and maintain. That high cost is why legacy systems stay in service for decades. It shapes how governments recruit for technical roles. It drives how agencies structure contracts and write solicitations. It’s baked into assumptions that have guided technology decisions for years.

Those assumptions are about to be challenged.

As code generation becomes cheaper and more reliable, the knowledge premium will shift. What will matter most in the future is not the ability to write code, but the ability to understand and document how a system actually behaves. The government agencies that will succeed in this new world will be the ones that can clearly articulate what they need, verify that what they’ve built works correctly, and maintain a coherent understanding of their systems over time.

This shift will reshape how governments modernize their legacy systems, adopt new digital solutions, staff projects, and structure procurements. The impact will be significant – but only for governments that position themselves to take advantage of it.

That means creating space to experiment: internal labs to experiment with AI tools, pilot projects, partnerships with vendors who understand what these changes mean specifically for the public sector. And it means listening to people who have been paying close attention to this shift and can help translate it into actionable steps.

These changes are happening very, very fast and governments need to get ready for them. Right now.