Hyperscalers Need 2.7x Productivity Gains to Justify $1.1T AI Infrastructure Spend by 2030
Post-reality · reddit · 2026-09-24
MIT Technology Review covers new research by Wharton finance professor Jessica Wachter and Jonathan Wachter, based on spending by Alphabet, Microsoft, Amazon, Meta and Oracle.
- Hyperscalers are on track to pour nearly $1.1 trillion into AI infrastructure through 2027
- After capital costs, depreciation and a required 15% return, the sector would need a 2.7-fold productivity increase by 2030 to justify the buildout
- The paper warns that if the expected boom fails to materialize, it could become "the largest misallocation of capital in history"
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