Pattern: Proxy Coworker Architecture — Route Agent Subtasks to Cheap Models to Extend Primary Budget

r/ClaudeAI·medium signal

The viral $0.02/call coworker post crystallizes a pattern emerging across multiple tools: use a proxy (liteLLM, claude-code-proxy, Kong AI Proxy) to route low-reasoning tasks (file reads, greps, simple edits) to Gemini Flash or GPT-4o-mini while reserving Opus/Sonnet for architecture decisions and complex debugging. The pattern works because 60-70% of agent tool calls are read-only operations that don't need frontier reasoning. Multiple implementations now exist across Claude Code, Cursor, and Aider, making this a cross-tool strategy rather than a single-tool hack.