I think part of the problem in discussing the impacts of convenience is the way we often ascribe moral weight to psychological or sociological impacts. Both things are true: choosing convenience is a morally neutral choice. and there are often negative impacts on social cohesion, your wellbeing and your cognition in some of these convenience choices.
And I do think it's important for us to be aware of the potential negative psychological and sociological impacts of the choices we make around convenience, so that we are able to make more informed choices.
Sociological research indicates that small social interactions, often called "weak social ties" (talking to a stranger at the checkout, saying hi when passing people on a trail, chit chat and small talk with people at work you see every day but have no deep connection with like the desk clerk etc.) are an important part of psycho-social wellbeing. You're never going to build community with them, but they do impact feelings of isolation and life satisfaction. And when convenience choices often remove those weak social ties from our lives, it negatively impacts our wellbeing.
Similarly, all skills including cognitive ones, are retained when they are practiced; if you don't practice skills, you lose them. And many convenience choices deprive us of the opportunity to practice those skills.
If your car has parking assist, you will probably find after a while that you struggle to parallel park without it, even though you used to be able to with no issue. Relying on GPS to navigate everywhere means you are likely to find yourself unable to navigate without it, even on routes that you've taken many times.
This is one of the issues we're seeing with GenAI/LLMs (aside from the obvious ethical issues of environmental impact and stolen content etc.). The more you use genAI/LLMs to find and sort through information, write content, summarise, analyse etc. the more you will struggle to do those tasks without assistance.
(I think it's also worth noting that convenience is often built into products for the express purpose of getting us to consume more. Infinite scroll keeps you on your phone more because they have removed the act of having to click 'next page', which makes continuing to engage an active choice. The removal of friction from our consumption makes impulse purchasing easier. Recommended products, 'remember my details for next time', one-click-checkout - these are all features that make us more likely to buy.)
There is no moral dimension to this - you are not a good person for choosing to "work hard" instead of go for the convenient option. You are not a bad person for craving convenience - it is arguably a very helpful evolutionary trait: achieving the same result while expending less energy is advantageous). The concepts of 'laziness' and 'productivity' are useless here.
And as OP pointed out, what may be a convenience choice to one person may be an accessibility need for someone else. So trying to make people feel bad for the choices they're making, or trying to force people to choose inconvenience through removing options and features isn't a solve.
But when we're making these choices, I do think it's important that we're aware of the impacts these choices have on us over time, as well as the exploitation that props up these services. And, more to the point, it's not a moral failing to struggle with these choices - companies exploit our very normal, very human desire for convenience to exploit people and keep us consuming.
