Joules-to-GDP: How Much Economic Value Do AI Systems Produce per Unit of Energy?
Which AI tasks deliver the most economic bang for each watt consumed
AI systems that do the most total work or earn the most money aren't necessarily the most efficient at converting energy into economic value. Researchers tested 220 real-world tasks across 44 occupations and found that software development delivers 27% more economic value per joule than engineering work, even though engineering produces more dollar value per task. A smaller, less powerful model (Gemma 4 31B) delivered 2.5 times more net economic value per joule than a larger one (GLM 5.2), despite producing only 56% of the absolute profit.
As AI systems consume enormous amounts of electricity, companies face pressure to maximize returns on energy spending, not just total output. This framework gives organizations a concrete way to choose which models and hardware setups actually make financial sense for different types of work. For occupations ranging from software development to legal analysis, picking the wrong model-to-hardware pairing could waste millions in energy costs while producing identical results.