AI Drives Huge Productivity Gains for Large Businesses While Small Businesses Are Left Behind
Amazon Proteus robots demonstrate autonomous navigation using floor-mounted barcodes during the Delivering the Future event at the Amazon Robotics Innovation Hub in Westborough, Massachusetts, United States, Thursday, November 10, 2022.
Bloomberg | Bloomberg | Getty Images
Artificial intelligence is widening the productivity gap between large and small businesses, allowing larger companies to efficiently scale technology and reduce human worker costs.
Large-cap companies are seeing consistent AI-driven productivity gains since the release of OpenAI’s ChatGPT model in 2022 in terms of real revenue per worker, according to a Wells Fargo analysis. Meanwhile, small-cap stocks are seeing a decline over the same period, the firm found.
“While the S&P 500’s productivity is up 5.5% since ChatGPT, it’s down 12.3% for the Russell 2000,” Wells Fargo equity strategist Ohsung Kwon wrote in a recent note to clients. “We’re seeing more examples of divergent trends across consumer, industrial and financial markets.”
Wells Fargo analysis comparing real income per worker between the Russell 2000 and S&P 500 indices
Wells Fargo
The revolutionary advances in AI this year have led major companies such as Amazon This includes going all-in on technology, finding ways to eliminate human roles that can be replaced by AI machines.
The performance of S&P500 against the Russell 2000 The small-cap index reflects this divergence in productivity gains. The broad market index is up 74% since ChatGPT launched in 2022, while the Russell is only up 39%.
America’s largest companies have deployed AI tools internally in recent years to improve productivity, improve supply chains and, in some cases, reduce headcount. A World Economic Forum survey released in early 2025 reveals that around 40% of companies worldwide plan to reduce their workforce over the next five years in roles where AI can automate tasks.
This year, layoffs have increased at several large companies, including Target, Meta, Starbucks, Oracle, Microsoft And UPSafter announcing significant, and sometimes historic, workforce reductions. Companies have mostly cited efforts to streamline their operations and growth strategy as reasons for reductions, but many give a nod to AI to explain that human worker roles may be eliminated now or in the future.
Amazon is notably a leader in deploying robots in its facilities, which the e-commerce giant says improves costs and delivery times. The New York Times reported in October that Amazon executives believe the company is on track to replace more than half a million jobs with robots, which they say would save about 30 cents on each item Amazon picks, packages and delivers to customers. Morgan Stanley estimates that Amazon’s robotics efforts can save the company between $2 billion and $4 billion by 2027.
Klarna, which has been among the most transparent about how AI affects its workforce, has reduced its workforce by about 40%, in part because of its investments in AI. CrowdStrike announced a 5% reduction in the company’s global workforce in May, citing the effectiveness of AI and saying the technology is “flattening our hiring curve.” IBM’s CEO predicts that 30% of non-customer-facing positions will be eliminated by 2028 and told the Wall Street Journal earlier this year that AI chatbots had replaced 200 human resources employees, freeing up investments to hire more people in sales and programming.
Palo Alto Networks, Walmart And McDonald’s There are other companies that have notably leveraged AI in ways that analysts believe will improve their margins, as we have previously reported.
An Intuit QuickBooks Small Business Insights survey of 5,000 small businesses in the United States, Canada, United Kingdom and Australia conducted in September found that 68% of businesses have integrated AI into their daily operations, and about two-thirds report an increase in productivity.
“The numbers don’t lie,” Wells Fargo’s Kwon said in his report.
