AI Tokenmaxxing: Companies Reward Heavy AI Use – NYT Report

An OpenAI engineer consumed 210 billion tokens – the equivalent of 33 complete copies of Wikipedia – in a single week, according to a report by The New York Times’ Kevin Roose. The revelation highlights a growing trend within tech companies, including Meta and Shopify, of evaluating employees based on their artificial intelligence usage, measured by the number of tokens processed.

Internal leaderboards are now tracking token consumption at these firms, with managers reportedly “rewarding workers who make heavy use of A.I. Tools and chastening those who don’t,” Roose wrote in a column published March 20, 2026. The practice has sparked comparisons to evaluating painters by the amount of paint used, or soldiers by the number of bullets fired, though Roose suggests a more apt analogy is NBA mascots judged by the volume of t-shirts launched from cannons – albeit expensive, Hermès-branded t-shirts.

The surge in token usage is linked to the increasing popularity of “claws,” or agentic AI platforms like OpenClaw. OpenClaw’s emergence this year prompted a shift in preference among some AI developers away from OpenAI’s GPT models and toward Anthropic’s Claude, leading OpenAI to acquire OpenClaw’s creator in an apparent effort to regain market dominance.

The trend extends beyond platforms like OpenClaw. Anthropic’s Claude Code is gaining features that facilitate constant interaction, including channels integrated with messaging apps like Telegram and Discord, allowing users to communicate with the AI directly from their phones. A promotional image for Claude Code channels features a cartoon crustacean, a symbol that has quickly become associated with excessive token consumption.

The focus on token usage isn’t limited to internal metrics. OpenAI President Greg Brockman recently touted that the coding-oriented GPT-5.4 processes 5 trillion tokens per day, generating an annualized revenue run rate of $1 billion. This emphasis on sheer volume, while potentially reassuring to investors, raises questions about the efficiency and value of AI deployment, according to observers.

A Swedish software engineer told Roose that his company spends more on his Claude Code tokens than his entire salary. Neither Anthropic nor OpenAI responded to requests for comment regarding the tokenmaxxing trend, according to the New York Times report.