$1M Unlimited Token AI Experiment: Costs Exceed Human Labor, Efficiency Gains Hit Ceiling

A Silicon Valley AI team lead shared results from a $1 million budget experiment allowing unlimited token usage for a team of over 20. The experiment found that AI costs are higher than human labor, team members are more fatigued, and efficiency gains hit a ceiling. The author argues that AI's true value lies in adoption from zero to one, not in unlimited token consumption.