I'm not interested in using AI to write code that would have taken me 5-10 minutes to write myself. I use AI to debug complex bugs and develop large features that span multiple domains - stuff that normally takes hours, if not days/weeks. A model that is "enough for 95%" does not cut it for that, because the failures compound during long-horizon tasks and the thing becomes a mess.
In my setup, I use a daily workhorse for such things. They should be fast, cheap and reasonably working well. I don’t expect it to be smart, but need it to follow instructions perfectly and handle tool calling well.
For architectural work or debugging help, I use the top models instead.
That works reasonably well for me with a low cost.