The city where people with a six-figure income are ‘poor’

THERE’S a city that makes Sydney property prices look like a bargain, where households earning six-figure salaries are considered “low income”.

AUSTRALIANS often complain about the high cost if living in our capital cities, but there is one place where it is so expensive to live that people on six-figure salaries are considered “poor”.

The housing prices and general cost of living in this United States city are so exorbitant that it makes buying a house in Sydney seem like a bargain.

In San Francisco, households that get by on $US117,400 ($AU159,000) a year are considered to be “low income”, according to a report from the US Department of Housing and Urban Development.

The report revealed San Francisco is one of the most expensive places to live in the whole country, with a salary of $US73,300 ($AU99,250) considered “very low income” for a family of four.

The average house San Francisco’s Bay Area will set you back $1.2 million.

The numbers were calculated against the median house price for a single family home in the city’s Bay Area, which currently sits at $US947,500 ($AU1.28 million).

Other Bay Area counties like San Mateo and Marin have similar low income limits.

These figures are more than double the income thresholds for people living in Australia’s most expensive city.

In Sydney, the “very low” range refers to households with an income of $42,900, while $68,600 is considered “low income”, according to the Australian Government’s Department of Social Services.

Sydney’s median house price is also lower than San Francisco, currently sitting at $1.15 million.

Director of the San Mateo County Department of Housing told KPIX 5 the number increased by 10 per cent from the previous year.

“That kind of shocks you. How is that possibly poverty by anybody’s measure? But it actually is for a family of four in our area,” he said.

The city has a very high rate of homelessness. Picture: Josh Edelson/AAP

There is no hiding the effects that high living costs are having on San Francisco’s residents. City statistics have showed there are 7500 homeless people living on the streets at any time, with the situation taking a dramatic turn of late.

A massive 25 million tourists visit the city each year, but rampant drug use, assaults and threatening behaviour has left people too scared to even walk down the street.

The city also suffered a huge financial blow when a major medical body pulled its annual convention because its members “no longer feel safe”.

The decision means that the city will miss out on the $US40 million ($AU54 million) the 15,000 attendees usually pump into the local economy.

A man lies on the sidewalk in San Francisco. Picture: Ben Margot/AAP

“It’s the first time that we have had an out-and-out cancellation over the issue, and this is a group that has been coming here every three or four years since the 1980s,” Joe D’Alessandro, president and CEO of S.F. Travel, the city’s convention bureau, told theSan Francisco Chronicle .

In March, an estimated 10,000 needles were taken off the streets, a massive increase from the 3000 that were found in the same period last year.

But despite these growing issues, the tourism industry brings in more than $12 billion every year.

The San Francisco Travel Association revealed US and international tourists continue to flock to the city by the bay with an increase in visitors of 1.7 per cent in 2017 and a projected increase of 2.6 per cent.