Every joke now feels like it was the first draft.
Before they would spend months crafting storylines, refining jokes, now a “And… and then Cartman eats Kyle… and Kyle’s cereal!” or “Make sure Kathleen Kennedy is not under my bed” is considered top tier writing.
Before the jokes were topical and diverse. Now it’s the same “handyman know more, so funny” joke over and over for 40 minutes.
They would not spend months doing anything. They would sometimes do a writer’s retreat right before the start of the season or start working on the season premiere a couple of days early, but otherwise it’s all done in 6 days.