> Anyone not using in house models is signing up to find out.
What are they finding out exactly? That Claude Max for $200/mo is heavily subsidized and it will soon cost $10k/mo?
> What happens to a company used to extracting surplus value from labor when the labor is provided by another company which is not only bigger but unlike traditional labor can withhold its labor indefinitely (because labor is now just another for of capital and capital doesn't need to eat)?
This can be trivially answered by a thought experiment. Let's pick a market where labor is plentiful - fast food.
Now what happens to McDonald's where they rent perfect robots from NoosphrFoodBotsInc? NoosphrFoodBotsInc bots build the perfect burger everytime meeting McDonald's standards. It actually exceeds those standards for McDonald AddictedCustomerPlus tier customers.
As the sole owner of NoosphrFoodBotsInc (you need 0 human employees to run your company, all your employees are bots), what are your choices?
I can't imagine the bots could ever cost McDonald's less than people cost.
15 years ago I worked at McDonald's for a few months after graduating into the Great recession. I worked from 5am to 1pm-ish 5 days a week. They paid workers weekly and I remember getting those checks for ~$235 each week (for 38 to 39.5 hours a week; they were vigilant about never letting anyone get overtime). About $47 per day.
The federal minimum wage has not risen since then, remaining at $7.25/hr. Inflation adjusted, $7.25 today would have been just under $5 then, so I guess I had it good.
Anyway, I would be shocked if bots could cost less than labor in min wage jobs.