This is the real doom loop. It will change everything about life in the Bay Area

San Francisco Chronicle​

14-07-2025

The Bay Area is facing a doom loop. It's just not the one we usually think about.
For years we've heard of the potential economic doom spiral circling San Francisco, where a massive city budget deficit fueled by remote work leads to poorer services and even more residents fleeing. But another threat has been building in relative silence.
The Bay Area is getting old fast, and it's accelerating. Though aging is a global trend, the San Francisco metro area — which includes San Francisco, Alameda, Contra Costa, San Mateo and Marin counties — is already the third-oldest among 20 of the largest regions in the U.S., trailing only two places in Florida. And no other region is growing older at a quicker pace.
That means fewer children, more elderly people and a declining number of 20-somethings. The confluence of demographic shifts will profoundly impact every aspect of life in the San Francisco area. Combined with rising housing costs and growing hostility toward immigration, the graying of cities and towns means the region's continued prosperity is in doubt.
'The aging thing might be the most important thing happening in American society that people aren't paying attention to enough,' said urbanism expert Richard Florida, a professor at the University of Toronto. 'And, in places like the Bay Area where everything's so expensive, it's arguably even more important.'
The Chronicle assigned journalists to explore various manifestations of the region's rapid aging, and will continue to do so through the rest of the year and beyond. We'd also like to hear from readers about their experiences with, and concerns about, the trend.
In Berkeley, we found a once-vibrant neighborhood that is now essentially a retirement community of single-family homes. In Sonoma County, we visited a city with a family-friendly reputation that lost 35% of its children in a decade. In San Francisco, we spoke to bar owners trying to survive a one-two punch: older patrons are spending less while younger guests are drinking less.
It's not all doom and gloom. We also found some industries thriving. A longevity clinic in South San Francisco serves patients who pay as much as $19,000 a year in a bid to live longer. And it's an excellent time to be offering financial services such as estate planning to the elderly.
The great aging of America will touch every community, from coast to coast. But, as it often does, the Bay Area will offer an early look at what's to come, with over half the people in the region's nine counties projected to be cresting 50 by 2055.
So just how old is the region?
Even before the COVID outbreak, the San Francisco metro area was one of the oldest in the U.S. During the pandemic, the metro's median age grew faster than any other major region, jumping from a little over 39 in 2020 to almost 41 in 2024. For context, Houston's number hasn't even reached 36 and Seattle is still approaching 38. Among the 20 largest metro areas in the U.S., San Francisco is now the third oldest, only bested by retirement-focused Miami and Tampa.
S.F. had the biggest increase in median age since 2020
Median age of residents in the 20 most populous metro areas
The San Francisco region is not alone. Every major U.S. metropolitan area has been growing older over the last several decades, with the share of seniors growing faster than the number of children, and most other rich countries are also facing the declining birth rates and longer lifespans that lead to an older population.
Still, the Bay Area is the tip of the cane. While most metros are likely to have more seniors than kids at some point in the 21st century, the San Francisco area is on track to see it happen as soon as the late 2020s.
S.F. now has a similar share of children as adults over 65
Share of residents under 18 and over 65 years in four metro areas from 2005 to 2023
Chart: Nami Sumida/S.F. Chronicle · Source: IPUMS USA, University of Minnesota
The San Francisco area already has the least children of the nation's 20 largest metros. In 2024, less than 19% of the area's population was under 18. And the county of San Francisco is even more devoid of kids, with just 13.5%, the second lowest share of the nearly 150 counties in the U.S. with over 500,000 people, second only to the county made up of Manhattan.
Of course, the Bay Area isn't uniformly elderly. Certain parts of the region — such as around the UC Berkeley and San Francisco State campuses, the city's Marina neighborhood and parts of downtown Oakland — are quite young.
Conversely, some areas are exceptionally old. Two Berkeley neighborhoods, Thousand Oaks and Northbrae, have median ages nearing 60. What makes these places remarkable is that, unlike most older communities, they don't include nursing homes or senior care centers. Most of the residents have been living there for over 20 years, according to a Chronicle analysis of census data.
Marin and Sonoma counties are also particularly old, with median ages of 48 and 44, respectively, placing them among the 25 oldest out of the nearly 300 counties in the U.S. with over 250,000 people.
Over the next several decades, the Bay Area is expected to age rapidly. Projections from the California Department of Finance suggest that about half of the people in the region's nine counties will be over 50 by 2055, with a median age of 51 or higher in San Francisco and San Mateo counties.
The area is expected to get a bit younger again after 2055, when most of the baby boomers have passed, but that's 30 years away.
The Bay Area will witness seismic changes brought by aging, including burdens on Social Security, emptier classrooms and a shallower labor pool, experts say.
The region will need more senior housing and services like home health aides, a difficult lift in an area with some of the nation's highest construction costs and a labor shortage for skilled caregivers. 'We have to grapple with the fact that this is the future,' said Stacy Torres, a UCSF assistant professor of social behavioral sciences and an expert on aging.
Public schools, already struggling with pandemic enrollment losses, may increasingly shutter, making it even more difficult to raise kids in the city and threatening more educators' jobs. And while powerhouses like Stanford and UC Berkeley are drawing plenty of applicants, colleges like San Francisco State and the University of San Francisco have seen enrollment declines since the pandemic, chipping away at the Bay Area's role as an education hub and the growth of its well-educated labor force.
The economy could stagnate further as a lack of young workers and stalled population growth cause 'downward pressure' on both labor supply and consumer demand, said Jeff Bellisario, executive director of the Bay Area Council Economic Institute, a business-backed think tank. A reduction in the number of young people is already hurting some businesses — seen in the struggles of bar owners — and could exacerbate a shortage of skilled workers.
Ted Egan, San Francisco's chief economist, notes that the number of younger people without college degrees was already dropping before COVID, while educated young people continued moving in, many for tech jobs. But post-pandemic, the number of educated young people has also declined.
To make matters worse, when residents do decide to have kids, they become more likely to leave the city, according to surveys. 'It's a major trigger point,' Egan said. 'People bump into space limitations in a rent-controlled apartment.'
For those lucky enough to be homeowners, California's landmark property tax cap, Proposition 13, has kept annual increases low. But there's a downside: studies show a 'lock-in' effect that discourages homeowners from moving out and potentially downsizing, constraining the supply of new listings. That has helped fuel both San Francisco's aging-in-place trend and the brutally expensive housing market.
Meanwhile, fertility rates are down in Mexico and China, two major sources of immigrants to the Bay Area. President Donald Trump has also singled out those countries in his immigration crackdown. 'I don't see immigration as a permanent source of population growth for the city if the underlying economics don't change,' Egan said.
Bellisario and Egan don't think aging will lead to the region's demise, particularly because it's a global trend. Instead, it's likely to spur broader efforts to adapt and adjust society.
'Does it break the region's economy?' Egan asked. 'It hasn't yet.'