by Wolf Richter
Wolf Street
“I’ve stopped defining worst-case scenarios because they keep getting worse every week”: San Francisco’s controller.
The lockdowns have created a fiscal nightmare for states and cities. But few major cities have gotten slammed as hard as San Francisco, whose single most important industry – tourism, including travel for leisure, conventions, and business – has essentially shut down and whose tech and unicorn startup sector has been laying off people in large numbers — a trend that started last year.
Uber, one of the largest employers in San Francisco, has been laying off people starting in 2019. Numerous startups have shut down or trimmed down before the lockdowns happened.