San Francisco-Oakland-Fremont vs Jacksonville

Cost of living comparison based on BEA Regional Price Parities. Jacksonville is 14% less expensive than San Francisco-Oakland-Fremont.

14% less expensive

Jacksonville, FL is 14% less expensive than San Francisco-Oakland-Fremont, CA on BEA Regional Price Parities (overall RPP 99.5 vs 115.6). A $100,000 salary in San Francisco-Oakland-Fremont buys about the same as $86,049 in Jacksonville; the largest component gap is services.

  • Overall RPP 115.6 (San Francisco-Oakland-Fremont) vs 99.5 (Jacksonville)
  • $100k in San Francisco-Oakland-Fremont ≈ $86,049 purchasing power in Jacksonville
  • Services drives the gap (-85.1 RPP points)

RPP parity plate

Pair CA:FL 115.6→99.5

TIER-GAP · CROSS-STATE · SERVICES-LED · BENCH-CROSS · PP-SHIFT

  • TIER-GAP Clear tier gap
  • CROSS-STATE CA × FL
  • SERVICES-LED Services-led gap
  • BENCH-CROSS Benchmark cross
  • PP-SHIFT PP shift

Instrument codes from this pair's BEA Regional Price Parities (overall · goods · services · rents · national benchmark 100 · purchasing-power conversion), not a ranking or recommendation.

What This Comparison Actually Tells You

San Francisco-Oakland-Fremont, CA and Jacksonville, FL sit in clearly different price tiers, separated by 16.1 RPP points. At this distance, treating the same nominal salary as equivalent would materially change purchasing power.

This route crosses the national benchmark: San Francisco-Oakland-Fremont is above 100 while Jacksonville is below it. That makes the move a change of price regime, not merely a rank swap.

Services leads the difference, with Jacksonville 85.1 points lower than San Francisco-Oakland-Fremont. Goods, services, and rents all point in the same broad direction, making the headline comparison more transferable across household types.

Comparable population context is incomplete for this pair, so no market-scale explanation is inferred from the price indexes.

For a service-heavy household, test childcare, health, and other locally supplied costs before relying on rent alone. The BEA ratio converts $100,000 in San Francisco-Oakland-Fremont to $86,049 in Jacksonville, but it is not a personal spending weight.

Category Breakdown

Visual Comparison

Overall
San Francisco-Oakland-Fremont
115.6
Jacksonville
99.5
Goods
San Francisco-Oakland-Fremont
108.5
Jacksonville
96.2
Services
San Francisco-Oakland-Fremont
172.6
Jacksonville
87.5
Rents
San Francisco-Oakland-Fremont
194.7
Jacksonville
109.8

Vertical line = national average (100)

Salary Equivalents

What a salary in San Francisco-Oakland-Fremont would need to be in Jacksonville for the same purchasing power:

In San Francisco-Oakland-Fremont In Jacksonville Difference
$50,000 $43,025 $-6,975
$75,000 $64,537 $-10,463
$100,000 $86,049 $-13,951
$150,000 $129,074 $-20,926
$ in San Francisco-Oakland-Fremont = in Jacksonville

Same BEA Regional Price Parity ratio as the table above (115.6 → 99.5), computed live from your number, nothing is sent anywhere.

San Francisco-Oakland-Fremont
115.6
Cost Index
Jacksonville
99.5
Cost Index

Frequently Asked Questions

Is Jacksonville more expensive than San Francisco-Oakland-Fremont?

Jacksonville is 14% less expensive than San Francisco-Oakland-Fremont. The overall cost index is 99.5 vs 115.6 (national average = 100).

What salary in Jacksonville equals $100K in San Francisco-Oakland-Fremont?

A $100,000 salary in San Francisco-Oakland-Fremont has the same purchasing power as $86,049 in Jacksonville. This is based on the BEA Regional Price Parity indexes.

How do rents compare between San Francisco-Oakland-Fremont and Jacksonville?

Rents in San Francisco-Oakland-Fremont are indexed at 194.7 while Jacksonville is at 109.8 (national average = 100). San Francisco-Oakland-Fremont has higher rents.

Data sourced from official public datasets, Regional Price Parities (2024), index where national average = 100. Retrieved and formatted by PlainCost. See our methodology for details.

Every figure on PlainCost is rendered directly from BEA Regional Price Parity source data, no number is typed in by an editor. See our editorial standards & corrections policy, the methodology behind these numbers, our changelog, or report a data error. Data current as of 2026-08-11. Rankings measure the published cost-of-living index only; we don't recommend where to live or rate any metro's quality of life.