Regional economic divides are deepening across OECD countries, both within and between regions. As policy makers turn to place-based strategies to address spatial inequalities, understanding how access to employment relates to income is increasingly important. This paper examines the association between job accessibility and income levels across the ten largest Functional Urban Areas in the United States.
Using a fine-grained metric that captures both job availability and labour market competition, this study reveals that the relationship between accessibility and personal earnings is highly spatially heterogeneous. Within cities, high access to better-paid, high-skilled jobs tends to be associated with higher incomes in central areas, but this link often weakens or reverses in car-dependent suburbs. Across regions, sprawling, polycentric metro areas show predominantly negative associations, while monocentric cities tend to concentrate positive effects in their cores.
These findings point to a complex trade-off between proximity to jobs and residential amenities. Making well-connected, central neighbourhoods more attractive and inclusive could yield wider benefits, not only boosting earnings, but also reducing sprawl, enhancing liveability and supporting more equitable regional development.
