I don't think this math depends on where that time is saved.

If I do all my work in 10 hours, I've earned $1500. If I do it all in 8 hours, then spend 2 hours on another project, I've earned $1500.

I can't bill the hours "saved" by ChatGPT.

Now, if it saves me non-billing time, then it matters. If I used to spend 2 hours doing a task that ChatGPT lets me finish in 15 minutes, now I can use the rest of that time to bill. And that only matters if I actually bill my hours. If I'm salaried or hourly, ChatGPT is only a cost.

And that's how the time/money calculation is done. The idea is that you should be doing the task that maximizes your dollar per hour output. I should pay a plumber, because doing my own plumbing would take too much of my time and would therefore cost more than a plumber in the end. So I should buy/use ChatGPT only if not using it would prevent me from maximizing my dollar per hour. At a salaried job, every hour is the same in terms of dollars.

It's like sale discounts - "save $50!" which actually means "spend $450 instead of $500"

Serious question: Who earns (other than C-level) $150 an hour in a sane (non-US) world?

US salaries are sane when compared to what value people produce for their companies. Many argue they are too low.

My firm's advertised billing rate for my time is $175/hour as a Sr Software Engineer. I take home ~$80/hour, accounting for benefits and time off. If I freelanced I could presumably charge my firm's rate, or even more.

This is in a mid-COL city in the US, not a coastal tier 1 city with prime software talent that could charge even more.

Most consultants with more than 3 years of experience are billed at $150/hr or more

Ironically, the freelance consulting world is largely on fire due to the lowered barrier of entry and flood of new consultants using AI to perform at higher levels, driving prices down simply through increased supply.

I wouldn't be surprised if AI was also eating consultants from the demand side as well, enabling would-be employers to do a higher % of tasks themselves that they would have previously needed to hire for.

> billed

That's what they are billed at, what they take home from that is probably much lower. At my org we bill folks out for ~$150/hr and their take home is ~$80/hr

Yeah, at a place where I worked, we billed at around $150. Then there was an escalating commision based on amount billed.

I do start at $300/hr

I didn’t just set that, I need to set that to best serve.

Why is high salaries an insane thing?

On the one hand, there's the moral argument: we need janitors and plumbers and warehouse workers and retail workers and nurses and teachers and truck drivers for society to function. Why should their time be valued less than anyone elses?

On the other hand there's the economic argument: the supply of people who can stock shelves is greater than the supply of people who can "create value" at a tech company, so the latter deserve more pay.

Depending on how you look at the world, high salaries can seem insane.

I don’t even remotely understand what you’re saying is wrong. Median salaries are significantly higher in the US compared to any other region. Nominal and PPP adjusted AND accounting for taxes/social benefits. This is bad?

Those jobs you referenced do not have the same requirements nor the same wages…seems like your just clumping all of those together as “lower class” so you can be champion of the downtrodden

The question is, whether you couldn't have saved those same 1.25 hours by using a $20 per month model.

In that case, wouldn't they be spending 200$ to get payed 200$ less?

Only if you're allowed to go home and enjoy those 1.25 hours and still get paid the same.