Here's a fun exercise — no pun intended — in San Francisco economics: Pay more, get less.

A recent transplant from New York discovered what a lot of SF gym-goers already know but have quietly accepted. In Manhattan, $229 a month gets you a full-service fitness complex with saunas, coworking space, seven squat racks, and a massive turf area. In San Francisco, $280 a month at Equinox on South Van Ness gets you... two squat racks, rows of empty treadmills nobody uses, no sauna, and people doing floor work in random corners because there's no dedicated space.

This is the SF premium in a nutshell. Sky-high commercial rents, a captive market of high-earning professionals, and almost zero competitive pressure to actually deliver value. Gym operators know you'll pay whatever they charge because — well, what's the alternative?

As one local put it bluntly: the Van Ness Equinox "is one of the worst Equinoxes — it's very small. All the other ones I've been to are more spacious and well-equipped." Which raises the question: why is a premier fitness brand charging premier prices for a subpar location?

The good news is there are options if you're willing to dig. Fitness SF's SoMa location emerged as the crowd favorite, with one SF resident noting it has "10+ squat racks and deadlift platforms, three full sets of dumbbells, and niche machines like a belt squat and tibialis raise." For the truly serious lifters, specialty spots like Invincible Barbell in the Mission cater to the Olympic and powerlifting crowd. Even UCSF's gyms got a mention as a sleeper pick.

But the broader issue isn't really about gyms — it's about what happens in a city where the cost of doing business is so astronomical that consumers get squeezed at every turn. Commercial landlords charge insane rents. Businesses pass those costs to you. Quality suffers because there's not enough square footage to justify proper equipment layouts. And the cycle repeats.

San Francisco loves to market itself as a world-class city. But when a place like New York — not exactly known for bargain living — consistently outperforms us on basic amenities per dollar spent, maybe it's time to ask harder questions about what our regulatory environment and commercial real estate market are actually producing.

You shouldn't need a research project just to find a gym with more squat racks than Pelotons gathering dust.