hokie, I don't believe that standard beam theory holds when a member becomes infinitely deep, so the answer to your question is it depends. For a very thin gusset, the mode of failure is not clear. But we are not talking about plates with infinite width.
Consider a plate 1 by 4 units (doesn't matter whether it's inches, cm or mm). If the plate is loaded concentrically with load P, the maximum stress is uniform throughout and is equal to P/4 or 0.25P.
Now, let's consider a plate 1 by 6 units with load applied, as before, 2 units from one edge such that the eccentricity is 1 unit. Now, A = 1*6 = 6 and S = 1*62/6 = 6. The maximum stress is P/A + M/S = P/6 + P*1/6 = P/3 or 0.3333P which is greater than 0.25P. It is not my opinion...it is a fact that the maximum stress is greater than it was for the concentric case. Of course, the minimum stress is P/6 - P/6 = 0. The average stress is P/6 which is only two thirds of the average stress in the concentric plate but if the loading is cyclic, I am suggesting this case may be more critical than the uniformly loaded plate.
If the load is static tension, then the concentric plate is considered to fail at A*Fy or 4Fy for the 1x4 plate. The 1x6 plate fails when the entire section is stressed to yield, mostly in tension but partially in compression. This occurs when P = 4.325Fy and M = 4.325Fy, slightly in excess of 4Fy for the smaller plate. So the eccentrically loaded 1x6 plate carries about 8% more load than the concentrically loaded 1x4 plate.
BA