I also did not like living in a city, but it is clear from prices that people are willing to pay a premium to live in major metro areas like Sydney, London, Paris, Amsterdam, New York, etc even in the post-pandemic work-from-anywhere world. Even in smaller cities the downtown areas seem to be doing just fine based on rent and occupancy.

I suspect the deeper problem is with San Francisco and similar cities that became more of a desirable place to work than a desirable place to live. When business is good the city does well, but when the businesses leave or go under people have no other reason to stick around given all the other negatives.

To give an example, my NYC friends moved there to be in NYC and only look for jobs that let them stay in NYC. Whereas my Bay Area friends primarily moved there because that's where they got the highest offers after college, and most of them would move (or already have moved) elsewhere if a better offer comes around.