People with enough money are able to insulate themselves from society's problems pretty thoroughly

I'd split it 15% too bought into the narrative and unwilling to admit failure, and 15% retirees living in sunset who never make it downtown.

Car theft is way up, but goes largely unnoticed by those without cars, or have private parking. Uber/Lyft just doesn't work sometimes now, but those that don't use either service aren't going to notice.

It's sad that eg the bbq joint down the street closed down, but I can't wait to see what ends up there next! Will it be a fancy tea place? or have some sort of interesting delicious fusion food? It's sad they didn't survive covid, but all of the restaurants I'll miss aren't a 30% hit to the quality of life - there are a bunch of restaurants that managed to survive, and even some that opened up during the pandemic!

For those that had never really explored their neighborhood until the pandemic, finding awesome things nearby their house like a hidden garden actually improves life from before the pandemic! I became close friends during the pandemic to some acquaintences, and it's absolutely improved my quality of life.

Change isn't necessarily bad, so the 30% aren't avoiding the change - they're embracing it, celebrating the good parts, complaining about the old and new problems, but not letting it dampen their optimism for the future.

I’ve lived in north beach for about 11 years. Not really sure how to answer your question other than to say I still love it as much as the day I moved in.

I have everything I need within walking distance. The weather is incredible. I’ve never been robbed or had any particularly bad experiences (I’m relatively tall and a man so ymmv).

I don’t know, from my perspective it’s a pretty great city unless you have to spend a lot of time in SOMA or the tenderloin.

I can certainly understand why others haven’t had the same experience. But I don’t think it’s surprising that 3 in 10 are able to say they still enjoy it. It all comes down to when you moved here, where you live, and how much you’re paying.

Probably the homeless folks.

That would still leave SF homeless underrepresented on HN.

Maybe they are criminals. They can steal all they want and not go to prison. Sounds like heaven for a thief.

Money

... and/or Stockholm syndrome?

Addendum/update:

Also, this context seems to share a lot of similarities with the rise and fall of the now abandoned ghost towns that emerged during gold mining, or am I the only one making this association?

I'm not sure about the numbers but I would guess that the sf evacuation is worse than the rest of the valley. It's just from what I've heard and not sure about how well it holds true for everyone that has left but have heard that people mainly lived there for convenience to be close to work or because they liked having fun at bars and stuff. Bars are tame now and this probably sounds bad but it's become more sketchy with the large homeless population in some areas and some areas are an open restroom and not sure of anyone that wants to live in an area like that. I'm not sure how to properly help the homeless population but the current status quo doesn't seem tenable.

There’s definitely an element of frog boiling but I also think the jolt of the pandemic forced people to reevaluate their situations.

BTW SF was itself a gold rush town, and its tolerance for weirdness* is often attributed to that.

* said tolerance for weirdness has seriously declined over the last couple of decades as people moved in for reasons other than that variety.