Dylan Patel – Two labs will soon control most of the world's workforce
Aug 25, 2026 · 1:16:53
Dwarkesh Patel and Dylan Patel (founder of SemiAnalysis) argue that Anthropic and OpenAI will control most of the world's usable FLOPs by 2028, since their revenue per megawatt (already $50M for Anthropic) lets them outbid everyone for compute. They break down lab economics: the labs are taking 40-50% of incremental compute next year, on track for 100 gigawatts combined by 2028, and will shift more compute from inference to training as RSI nears. They also predict the resulting $11T of AI capex through 2029 (with $5T of credit) will raise interest rates ~250 basis points, triggering a sovereign debt crisis in countries like Pakistan and Nigeria and crushing non-AI equities. Finally, they explore whether anything can counter centralization — noting China has sub-10% of new compute (30GW by 2028, ramping to 50GW) — but see no clear force preventing two labs from dominating.
