Cost of Living for Retirees Using BEA RPP
A practical first screen for comparing published price levels across possible retirement locations.
Start with the price level
BEA RPP makes the geographic price gap visible. It does not turn that gap into a personal retirement budget.
- Arkansas
- lowest state RPP in this dataset: 86.9
- 100
- national-average RPP for a given year
- 2024
- data vintage used in the metro example
Use the all-items value to orient yourself, then inspect rents, goods, and services before comparing a particular move.
What RPP Can Answer
Regional Price Parities compare the price levels of goods, rents, and services across states and metropolitan areas for a given year. A value of 100 is the national average. Lower values indicate a lower published price level; higher values indicate a higher one.
That makes RPP useful when the question is simple: how does the published price level in one place compare with another? It is especially useful for spotting cases where a familiar all-items headline conceals a different rent, goods, or services profile.
What RPP Does Not Answer
RPP is an area-level measure, not a retirement plan or a quote for your household. It does not calculate taxes, insurance premiums, benefit eligibility, medical care access, home prices, or the availability of a particular rental.
Look Under the All-Items Headline
Similar all-items RPP values do not mean the same mix of prices. The component values below use the same BEA dataset as the rest of PlainCost. They show why it is worth checking rents, services, and goods instead of stopping at one number.
Phoenix has an all-items RPP of 103.3 and Charleston has an all-items RPP of 101.0. Their component values are different: Phoenix records rents at 121.2, services at 93.3, and goods at 95.0; Charleston records rents at 119.8, services at 88.2, and goods at 96.3.
Phoenix & Charleston, by RPP component
Published price levels in the same BEA data vintage
- Phoenix rents
Phoenix rents
121.2 RPP
- Charleston rents
Charleston rents
119.8 RPP
- Phoenix services
Phoenix services
93.3 RPP
- Charleston services
Charleston services
88.2 RPP
- Phoenix goods
Phoenix goods
95 RPP
- Charleston goods
Charleston goods
96.3 RPP
What this shows The all-items figures are close, while the rent, services, and goods components differ. The chart is a price-level comparison, not a prediction of a household's expenses.
A Fixed-Income Illustration
The same nominal amount has different purchasing-power equivalents when the area-level RPP differs. In this dataset, $60,000 maps to about $69,003 of national-average purchasing power in Mississippi (RPP 87.0) and about $54,570 in Hawaii (RPP 110.0).
This is a comparison of published price levels only. It does not estimate what any person will spend or whether either location is a better choice.
Compare the Places You Are Considering
Start with the state directory for a broad comparison, then use the metro directory to see local component values. The comparison tool puts two metros side by side, and the calculator converts an amount between their published RPP levels.
Frequently Asked Questions
What does BEA Regional Price Parities measure?
RPP compares the price levels of goods, rents, and services across places for a given year. The national average is 100.
Can I use RPP to compare retirement locations?
Yes, as a first screen for published price levels. It does not estimate an individual budget or answer tax, insurance, medical-care, or housing-availability questions.
Why look at components as well as all-items RPP?
Two places can have similar all-items values but different rents, goods, and services values. The components show where those differences sit.
A sensible way to use this page
Use RPP to compare a published price level, then do the personal verification separately.
- Check the all-items value first, then compare rents, goods, and services. Compare metros
- Use state and metro pages to narrow the places worth researching further. Browse states
- Treat tax, insurance, housing, and care decisions as separate research questions.
RPP is published price-level data. It is not personal financial, tax, insurance, or medical advice.
Source: U.S. Bureau of Economic Analysis, Regional Price Parities. Medicare Plan Compare is linked only as an official place to review plan options. RPP is not personal financial, tax, insurance, or medical advice.
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. Rankings measure the published cost-of-living index only; we don't recommend where to live or rate any metro's quality of life.