San Francisco\u2019s economy may, at long last, be taking a turn for the better, according to the city\u2019s controller.\u00a0<\/p>\n
A new report<\/a> published Friday suggests that the city has reached an \u201cinflection point.\u201d By several indicators, the city\u2019s economic vitality is improving: Information sector jobs are up, as are hotel revenues and public transit ridership levels. Meanwhile, unemployment and office vacancies are down.<\/p>\n The report comes as San Francisco is experiencing its weirdest<\/a> tech boom, according to the city\u2019s chief economist, Ted Egan, who co-wrote the report and spoke with Mission Local about the issue last month.<\/p>\n The AI industry is attracting huge investment to the city and its tech workforce: Some $57 billion<\/a> in venture capital investment went to companies in San Francisco in 2025, according to the Silicon Valley Institute for Regional Studies. But at the same time, the widespread adoption of AI is prompting mass layoffs<\/a>, primarily in the tech sector.<\/p>\n Despite those layoffs, the city\u2019s unemployment rate sat at just under four percent in February, its lowest level in eight months.\u00a0<\/p>\n \u201cJob listings have recently trended positive in San Francisco and other tech hubs, and the city\u2019s unemployment rate also has dipped in 2026,\u201d the controller\u2019s office wrote. \u201cIf this is a durable sign of a bottoming in tech hiring, that would be broadly positive for the city\u2019s economy going forward.\u201d<\/p>\n But the AI boom has another consequence: New highly paid workers coming to the city are causing rents to skyrocket<\/a>.<\/p>\n This, the city says, is a good thing \u2014 economically. In at least three other reports from the last year, the controller\u2019s office has characterized this rent growth as a \u201cbright spot.\u201d Higher rents are needed to push profit margins up and incentivize developers to build more housing, pro-housing groups say.<\/p>\n But that\u2019s bad news for tenants, who make up close to two thirds of San Francisco\u2019s residents.<\/p>\n Over a third of San Francisco households are rent-burdened, meaning they spend more than a 30 percent of their income on rent. Eviction notices, while lower than historic trends, have continued to rise<\/a>.\u00a0<\/p>\n As of last month, the average asking price for a one bedroom apartment in San Francisco was $3,356, up from $3,117 in December, an increase of over seven percent in four months, according to data from Apartment List.\u00a0<\/p>\n