> It's worth pointing out that the poverty line is S.F. is 82k while the federal level is 12k.

No, its not. $82k is the federal HUD “Low income threshold” for San Francisco, which is not even loosely analogous to the poverty line; HUD income limits are calculated from local median income, not costs, and the low income limit is 80% of the median (and its the highest of three limits; there’s also a very low and extremely low income limit.) Its not a location-adjusted poverty measure, and based on national income distribution to federal poverty line comparison, if you were to abuse it that way the least bad way would be to use the extreme low income threshold, not the low income threshold.

The poverty line is so high primarily because of housing prices, right? Costs of tents, food, etc. don’t really scale in the same way that housing prices do, so I don’t think the comparison is worth much.

That number includes a tent set up somewhere, so rent is definitely a variable.