Capitalist structures are hierarchical and thus more amenable to fascism than equitable socialist structures, so the idea that "supporting the status quo" will help against a far right rise is laughable.
You're overthinking this. You can almost always get by with whatever system you already have available, until you get a full job, at which point the job will probably provide you with a machine.
I think you're misunderstanding the insert method. insert keeps everything that was already in the list, including the item at the given index. it just shifts part of it to the right to make room for the thing you're inserting. Directly changing the list using display[position] = letter instead replaces the item at the index with letter.
I thought SpaceChem uses the same mechanic as Opus Magnum where the benefit of optimization is just the player's place on the histogram. I'm looking for more interaction between machines than that.
Shapez looks like it has the same problem as factorio, where expanding outwards is always possible and easier than micro-optimizations. That's not the kind of gameplay I'm looking for.
After listening to a song a bunch of times I'll often look for covers and mashups.