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Does better work always mean better workers?
A three-month randomized controlled trial with 133 practicing patent lawyers found that AI consistently improved patent-drafting quality, but durable unassisted judgment gains depended on seniority. After 90 days, senior lawyers with AI access outperformed controls by 0.45 standard deviations on a no-AI redlining task, while junior lawyers showed no average skill gain and a wider spread of scores. AI raised drafting quality by 0.34 SD after 10 days and 0.38 after 90 days, showing that better work does not necessarily build expertise equally.