# Christophe Pettus: All Your GUCs in a Row: parallel_setup_cost and parallel_tuple_cost

> **Key Architectural Takeaway:** PostgreSQL's parallel query planner charges two fees for going parallel: a setup cost per Gather node and a per-row cost for moving data from workers to… (I consult on PostgreSQL through PGX Inc..).

**Published:** 2026-10-10T01:00:00+00:00  
**Source:** Planet PostgreSQL  
**Category:** databases-storage  
**Canonical URL:** https://fosswire.org/news/christophe-pettus-all-your-gucs-in-a-row-parallelsetupcost-a.html  

## Executive Summary
PostgreSQL's parallel query planner charges two fees for going parallel: a setup cost per Gather node and a per-row cost for moving data from workers to… (I consult on PostgreSQL through PGX Inc..)

## Architectural & Systems Analysis
From an OLTP/OLAP systems architecture, storage tiering, and data durability perspective:

- **Zero-Vendor Lock-in Formats:** Leveraging open specifications (e.g. Parquet, Iceberg) ensures multi-engine interoperability without ingestion lock-in.
- **Vector & In-Memory Throughput:** Modern memory layouts and SIMD-accelerated execution pipelines minimize latency in real-time retrieval.
- **Distributed Resiliency:** Decoupled storage and compute layers enable elastic horizontal scaling with strict ACID guarantees.

## Impact on the Open Ecosystem
Empowers data engineers with open, self-hosted alternatives to monopolistic cloud database providers.