An affordable housing complex in San Francisco at Geary Boulevard and Sixth Avenue is pictured in 2025. More housing at all income levels is needed to accommodate the demand for homes when Anthropic and OpenAI go public.

After years of empty offices, shuttered storefronts and national ridicule, San Francisco is poised to experience an extraordinary infusion of wealth almost overnight.

Anthropic and OpenAI plan initial public offerings of stock with valuations that make previous tech booms look tiny. Uber, for example, went public with an $82.4 billion valuation in 2019. OpenAI is valued at $852 billion and Anthropic at $965 billion.

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The newly minted millionaires and billionaires who work at these San Francisco companies almost certainly won’t all stay at their day jobs. Many will branch out to form companies of their own, creating an even broader constellation of wealth and industry.

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Whether this economic ecosystem brings relief to San Francisco’s struggling budget or crushes what’s left of our dwindling middle class is now up to city leaders.

San Francisco has repeatedly failed to manage the civic consequences of its previous technology booms.

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Abundant housing is the puzzle piece that can allow San Franciscans and their tax base to benefit from the AI boom. San Francisco is not allowed to levy an income tax on the newly rich. But it can benefit from their property taxes and spending — if it creates room for them to live in the city.

And yet, once again, thousands of........

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