The data paints a grim but unsurprising picture. Across the country, major metro areas — and especially coastal California — remain firmly in the "unaffordable" category for average earners. The Bay Area, naturally, sits at the deep end of the pool. Median home prices here still hover in the realm of the absurd, requiring household incomes that would be considered upper-class virtually anywhere else in America just to qualify for a modest mortgage.

But here's the thing the affordability doomers often miss: this isn't just a market failure. It's a government failure. San Francisco and California more broadly have spent decades layering regulations, permitting requirements, environmental reviews, and zoning restrictions on top of each other until building new housing became a Herculean feat of bureaucratic endurance. Every new unit that doesn't get built is a unit that can't bring prices down. Supply and demand isn't a suggestion — it's a law.

As one local put it, "We've created a system where it takes longer to approve a housing project than it takes to actually build one." That's not an exaggeration. In SF, the entitlement process for new construction can drag on for years before a single shovel hits dirt.

The frustrating part? We know what works. Cities that streamline permitting, reduce regulatory burdens, and allow density near transit have seen real results. Houston, Tokyo, even Minneapolis have shown that when you let people build, prices stabilize.

Instead, San Francisco continues to treat every new development like it needs to pass through seven circles of bureaucratic hell. We mandate affordable housing percentages that make projects financially unviable, then wonder why developers go build in Austin instead.

The map is just confirmation. The solution isn't more government programs — it's less government obstruction. Let people build, and they will come. More importantly, let people build, and the rest of us might actually be able to afford to stay.