Spending 20% of Developer Salaries on AI Tokens Is Realistic
Paul Erlang · How We Got Fred Wilson, Benchmark and Index to Invest $94M | Why Robinhood's Strategy is Wrong · 20VC with Harry Stebbings · Jun 27, 2026 · at 27:18
Paul Erlanger is the co-founder and CEO of FOMO. Host Harry Stebbings asks if tech companies will eventually spend up to 20% of developer salaries on AI model tokens.
0:00 / 0:12exact quote · 12.1s
▶ Watch the full episode on YouTube → 720p mp4 · rendered on demand · StarZero watermark
“But, yeah, so hopefully they get cheaper with time, energy gets cheaper, compute gets cheaper, and then these things get cheaper, but at the current state, absolutely. I think 20% is definitely within reason.”
quote is from the automated transcript, cleaned for reading: filler sounds and stutters are removed, nothing is rephrased. names can be misheard (the analysis reads context, assessments check outside sources). how →
More from Paul Erlang
Benchmark Lacks the Platform Resources of Multistage Funds
“I think Benchmark doesn't really have as many resources. Like these multistage funds have so many resources for founders.”
FOMO Operates With No Meetings, One-on-Ones, or Hierarchy
“So currently FOMO is extremely horizontal. We don't have meetings, one-on-ones. We don't really have any hierarchy. Everyone is kind of self-reporting.”
FOMO Holds More Cash in Bank Than Total Capital Raised
“Our team is scaling. I mean, we're making money. We have much more money in the bank than we ever raised.”
Lack of Consumer Protection Against Scam Coins Destroyed Crypto Sentiment
“And I think what's given such a bad rep is there's no consumer protection here on a lot of these products. So people will buy it. It's so hard to do in the first place, but then they get over the leap of actually doing the thing and then they just lose all the…”