THE NUMBER
Companies are spending more on AI every month. But when they were offered a more powerful, more expensive version of the same tool, they overwhelmingly stuck with the cheaper one. On real company spending tracked by Ramp, a corporate spending platform that sees where companies’ money actually goes, the premium version pulled in only about a tenth of the dollars, and Ramp’s blunt read was that “more performance is not worth the price tag.” Willingness to pay is the only honest measure of what a tool is worth, and this whole issue is about measuring yours.
3 THINGS HAPPENING RIGHT NOW
Companies are starting to pull the plug on AI they decided was not worth it
Gartner, a major technology research firm, predicted in 2025 that more than 40% of company AI agent projects will be scrapped by the end of 2027. The reasons are plain: the cost ran too high, the payoff never showed up, or the risk was not worth it. This is not “AI does not work.” It is companies pricing what they are getting, deciding it is not worth what they are paying, and stopping.
Half of small businesses say AI has paid for itself. A quarter say it has not.
Bluevine, a small-business banking firm, surveyed 942 owners this year. 52% said their AI tools earned back what they spent, and 24% have not seen a return yet and are stuck in trial and error. Nearly half save at least four hours a week. Same tools, same prices, opposite verdicts, which tells you worth is not a property of the tool but a judgment each owner makes.
The tools you already use are getting an AI layer, free until you need more
Meta launched Muse for Small Business, an AI assistant wired into apps owners already run: Slack, Asana, Canva, Intuit, Zoom, plus their ad and social accounts. It is free up to a usage limit, then you pay once you go past it. That pricing puts willingness to pay inside the product. You only start paying when it is doing enough work that paying feels worth it.
THE DEEP DIVE
What the whole economy’s spending reveals about your own
Every month, a corporate spending platform adds up where companies actually put their AI dollars. The latest read is strange. Firms keep raising what they spend on AI, so they are clearly sold on it. But offered a more powerful, more expensive version of the tool, they mostly declined: the premium tier took only about a tenth of the dollars, and the platform’s flat conclusion was that the extra performance “is not worth the price tag.”
That is not a verdict about AI. It is thousands of businesses each answering one question with their own money: is the better version worth more to me than the cheaper one? Most said no. A few said yes and happily paid up.
Here is why it matters to you. You can read the same signal off your own spending, and it runs both ways. The tools you would not repurchase at any price are the ones to cut. The one you would gladly pay five times as much for is the one you are underusing, and probably should lean on harder. Price is a number the seller sets. Worth is a number only you can set, and the honest way to read it is to ask whether you would buy the thing again.
ONE THING TO TRY THIS WEEK
Week 4 of 4: The repurchase audit
You know what your AI tools cost. You have probably never asked what they are worth to you, which is a different number. Here is the only question that measures it, run across everything you actually pay for, with Claude doing the math.
Pull up your real list of paid AI tools. Use your bank or card statement, not your memory. Write each one down with its monthly price next to it.
Next to each tool, write one of three tags, based on a single question: if this vanished tomorrow and came back at five times the price, would I buy it again today with my own money? The tags are “yes, at 5x,” “only at today’s price,” and “no, not at any price.”
Open Claude Code and hand it the list. On a Mac open Terminal, on Windows open PowerShell, type
claudeand press enter. Then paste something like: “Here is my list of paid AI tools with a monthly price and a tag on each. Total up the monthly cost of everything tagged ‘no, not at any price’ so I know what I save by cancelling them. Then look at the ones tagged ‘yes, at 5x’ and tell me, for the top one or two, how I could get more out of a tool I clearly value more than I pay for it.”Act on it this week. Cancel the “no” list, that is real money back every month. Then pick the one tool you said you would pay 5x for and lean on it harder, because that is the one you are underusing. The audit finds both at once: what to cut, and the one thing worth paying more for.
Stuck? Reply to this email. I’ll help.
WHAT’S COMING
That is four weeks on what your tools cost and what they are actually worth. Next, we turn from counting to building: the next thing to put to work while you sleep.
Manu