Sure, there are complexities like that in the world. However, where programmer A writes an if-else statement or, maybe, a 5-line dynamic dispatch, programmer B installs some "enterprise" framework or a rules engine, instantly making the entire system an order of magnitude more complex.
What programmers like B often doesn't realize is that they push core logic of the application from their source code (Turing complete, expressive, versioned, benefiting from static and dynamic analysis and all the testing/refactoring tools available for the language) into an obscure XML notation or even some proprietary rules database, worked upon by a complicated blob of 3d party code that has nothing to do with the original business problem.
Well we're talking about different things, now. Per Brooks, I was talking about essential complexity, you're talking about accidental complexity.
The point is that in web frameworks, the two are often confused or at least blurry. So we need to extend the essential/accidental dichotomy to deal with global versus local views.
Take for example parsing emails. In a universal sense the complexity is accidental, it arose from the technology decisions of the authors of RFC822 (which partly arose from previous decisions).
But locally, for a web programmer, the email address format is an immutable, irreducible fact of reality. I can no more wish away that complexity than I can wish myself a million dollars. To me it is an essential complexity.
Where web frameworks of the entirely-made-out-of-code variety really shine is in facing up to these locally essential complexities. It may seem superfluous now. It may not seem so in six months.
What programmers like B often doesn't realize is that they push core logic of the application from their source code (Turing complete, expressive, versioned, benefiting from static and dynamic analysis and all the testing/refactoring tools available for the language) into an obscure XML notation or even some proprietary rules database, worked upon by a complicated blob of 3d party code that has nothing to do with the original business problem.