I've been wondering if this was an issue on the horizon. With the costs of hardware (RAM for example), power (datacenter going up in Utah that requires more power than the entire state) and using up natural resources like water to run those datacenters, what is the actual overall expense of pushing this envelope and at what point does that become more expensive than humans doing the work? Some believe we are already there.

'The cost of compute is far beyond the costs of the employees': Nvidia executive says right now AI is more expensive than paying human workers

Fortune article that is paywalled, at archive:
https://archive.is/lshJ6#selection-355.0-355.142

^{<marginally related>}

OTOH, if you can't find enough humans to employ in your crappy job in your xenophobic country your solutions turn to tech...

"industry is wrestling with a labour crunch brought on by an increase in inbound tourism and a declining working-age population"

Japan Airlines trials humanoid robots as ground handlers
https://www.bbc.com/news/articles/cpwp87j1llvo

>> right now

Though the increase in operations per watt is slowing down, computer architectures are likely to evolve faster than human brains and bodies.

There were increases as high as 25% per year in the old days, but even 10% means halving costs in seven years.