The money also suggests that tech companies are starting to wade more deeply into California’s fraught housing politics. While tech companies have proposed building housing and their founders and associated foundations have put money into political campaigns, they have for the most part avoided taking positions with corporate money. Stripe’s donation to California Yimby is the company’s first political donation of any kind.

“This may well be the beginning of tech firms deciding that they need to help solve this crisis,” said Brian Hanlon, California Yimby’s founder. “They don’t have a viable business model in California if the housing crisis continues unabated.”

Stripe’s donation could end up being controversial. The so-called Yimby movement — whose platform is to cut back zoning and other regulations so that housing is easier to build — has been criticized by tenants’ groups for its connections to the tech industry and accused of being insufficiently worried about the concerns of poorer renters. Nevertheless, there is little debate among economists that California’s crisis will persist until housing is more plentiful.

“We can sit back and sort of watch this unfold around us and abstain from taking any action or stance because we think that there might be some blowback that might be unpleasant for us,” Mr. Collison said. “But given just how severe the issue is, I really think that would be mistaken.”