> Efficiency is always good

https://hbr.org/2019/01/the-high-price-of-efficiency

Efficiency is almost always at the cost of resilience. And that's just one dimension where efficiency is not always good.

Sauron was a villain not because he loved evil, but because he loved efficiency above all other things.

Learning that efficiency comes with a cost, and sometimes that cost is our humanity, was a hard lesson for me to learn.

We always need to consider efficiency, but not always pursue it.

Nothing is always good at any cost.

I am not saying that, I am saying that if a division can be run with half the people, there is nothing wrong in firing 40% of the people in that division, just to have a little overhead in case of emergencies.

Sure, in the platonic ideal of that example. But in the real world, firing 40% of a division will almost always mean a higher workload for the 60% remaining, which in turn leads to lower quality of life for those people, which often leads to higher turnover and projects getting dropped / mistakes getting made / etc.

This squeeze for efficiency is killing society fast, mark my words, no one but the most desperate will be willing to play that game to the end.

It will of course also increase desperation, which will make it seem like it sort of works all the way until it obviously doesn't.

Humans have to be put back at the top of the priority list, your line of reasoning is one better left to computers.