Counterexample: you could live where I live (upstate New York) on a tenth of the cost of San Francisco. A homeless person with marginally employable skills that moved from SF to upstate NY could work and afford to live in a home with heat and running water.
But if people choose not to work, I don't see what makes them any more "entitled" to live in a city than the people who work to make rent and pay taxes to support the services the city needs.