other replies mentioned that the cost of the slowdown is absorbed by the cloud provider; let's just pretend it's fully passed down to the user and only nitpick

other replies mentioned that the cost of the slowdown is absorbed by the cloud provider; let's just pretend it's fully passed down to the user and only nitpick at the math behind the joke: Imagine a slowdown (performance penalty) of 50%. It would double the time to complete a task, thus doubling the cost (expressed in cost increase that would be a 100% increase!). Generic formula: 1÷(1−x)−1 For x = 25% ---> 1÷(1−0.25)−1 = 33% duration (cost) increase