Well, the pandemic and economic depression have certainly exacerbated things. I also doubt that tourism in most places in California will really resemble pre-quarantine times until at least June 15th.

Yes. The economic downturn definitely was another major cause. There was increased crime even in the suburbs. However, that crime was mostly car break-ins, catalytic converter thefts, garage break-ins, package thefts. Violent crime doesn’t seem to have increased much unlike in SF and apparently other big cities.

Fair, but a lot of the anecdote details you mentioned aren't really attributable to the increase in violent crime. As mentioned elsewhere, Walgreens closing might be caused by economic downturn impacting a business strategy of market saturation (https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=27273139 and second child post).

The city also feels dead because tourism everywhere in the U.S. is currently dead. SF Chinatown is most definitely not comparable to the state of Oakland Chinatown:

https://abc7news.com/man-shot-killed-in-broad-daylight-oakla...

Oakland's homicide rate is skyrocketing, but so are its housing prices. Goes to show that in the Bay Area as a whole, crime and desirability of living often fail to correlate. SF's problem might simply be people don't want to live in a dense area during a societal shutdown.

I probably wasn’t clear enough. I think there has been an increase in property crime in the suburbs but their violent crime rate doesn’t seem to have increased as much as it has in the cities.

Violent crime has increased in the cities based on statistics that I have read.

Walgreens is probably multifactor but it is guaranteed that the shoplifting hurt badly.

Yes the cities are dead partly due to lost of tourism. However, it isn’t only that. Commercial real estate occupancy rates are worse than during the dot com bust.

Real estate is multifactor. Real estate is booming everywhere in the Bay Area possibly with the exception of SF, not just Oakland.

I think the problem ailing cities is density. East Bay real estate booming while SF prices declining is possibly effect and cause. A tiny apartment in a dense city is not a great place to be in during a quarantine. And correct, the end to all of those commercial real estate leases means much less money going into the economy. New York and other big cities are facing the same doom-and-gloom narrative:

https://www.nytimes.com/2021/05/12/opinion/New-York-San-Fran...

So yes, SF's crime issues are a pervasive problem. But the current decline ultimately all come down to economic factors and simple geography. Maybe Boudin has exacerbated things, but he has been in office for a minute compared to the past decade of spiraling property crime in the city.