This is less and less true as time goes on, and only for either heavily parallelized processes, processes that require ENORMOUS amounts of memory, or processes that require extreme amounts of GPU. Even then, the GPU gap is getting smaller if you're not talking about gaming.
I compile Unreal Engine for my job. I do it a lot. My M1 Mac Mini, 5 years old, keeps up astonishingly well with my work-issued i9. I'm sure an M5 would blow it out of the water.
I'm sure there are workloads where what you're saying is true, but I don't think you can make this as a broad claim anymore. M-series chips aren't low-powered chips, they're higher efficiency chips. They do more with less. I don't look at benchmarks from Apple (or Intel), either--I only pay attention to benchmarks from 3rd parties, and they're still quite favourable. Aside from gaming--where we ABSOLUTELY optimize the hell out of things, and tune things specifically to hardware as best as we can--most general purpose software that runs on both runs within a totally acceptable margin either way.