The average US executive assistant costs $75,000–$95,000 per year in salary alone. Add benefits (25–30%), payroll taxes, onboarding, and management overhead, and the true cost lands between $105,000 and $130,000 annually. SetupNemoClaw deploys a capable AI agent for a one-time fee of $2,250.
The Full Cost of a Human EA
- Annual salary: $75,000–$95,000
- Benefits and health insurance: +25–30%
- Payroll taxes (FICA, FUTA, SUTA): +8–10%
- Onboarding and training: $3,000–$8,000 one-time
- Management time: 2–4 hours/week
- PTO, sick leave, turnover risk
The Full Cost of SetupNemoClaw
- One-time setup fee (Cloud VPS): $2,250
- Monthly server cost: $20–50/month
- Year-one total: ~$2,850
- Year-two and beyond: $240–600/year
- No management overhead
- No PTO, no turnover
What the AI Agent Does
SetupNemoClaw handles email triage (reading, categorizing, and drafting replies), calendar management (scheduling meetings, resolving conflicts, sending reminders), workflow automation (CRM updates, follow-up sequences, document routing), and daily briefings. It operates 24/7 across all time zones.
What the AI Agent Cannot Do (Yet)
A human EA excels at tasks requiring deep interpersonal judgment, in-person coordination, complex negotiation, and highly nuanced relationship management. If those represent the majority of your EA workload, a human is the right choice. For the 70–80% of EA work that is information processing and workflow execution, SetupNemoClaw is faster, cheaper, and more consistent.
The Hybrid Strategy
Many of our customers pair SetupNemoClaw with a part-time human EA. The AI handles volume; the human handles judgment-intensive work. This combination costs roughly $40,000–$60,000 per year while delivering more capacity than a single full-time EA at $110,000+.