Reproduce “The RSI Tax: When Recursive Self-Improvement Is Not Worth the Cost” on OpenResearch

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About this paper

Yitong Zhang, Ang Li, Yisen Wang

The authors measure an agent’s total token cost as task execution plus the RSI Tax for self-improvement, including rejected update attempts. Simple Reflection with Notes (SRN) revises one bounded note from task failures and supplies it later. Across four model–environment settings, SRN uses 68.2% fewer total tokens than three other update methods, with higher or tied observed accuracy; results cover only the studied streams.

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