Chico vs Medford
Metro-area medians — Chico, CA Metro Area vs Medford, OR Metro Area — not the cities proper.
Medford comes out ahead, winning 8 of the 9 clearly-decided measures.
Chico and Medford cost about the same to live in, but Medford households earn about 14% more. Adjusted for local prices, a typical paycheck stretches further in Medford.
For your salary & household
Enter your pay and household size to see what it's really worth here — the numbers update live and the link stays shareable.
On $75,000 for just you, Chico leaves you about $3,083/yr better off after tax and local prices.
Take-home estimates a single filer taking the standard deduction (2025 federal brackets, FICA, and state income tax) and isn't tax advice. “Real value” rebases take-home to average U.S. prices using the BEA cost-of-living index; the per-person figure uses the OECD square-root equivalence scale.
Choose Medford for
- + Livability (CityLedger)
- + Cost-adjusted income (pay's real value)
- + Median household income
- + Median rent
- + Unemployment
- + Bachelor's degree or higher
- + Average commute
- + Air quality (median AQI)
Chico vs Medford — frequently asked
- Is Chico cheaper than Medford?
- They are about even — the overall cost of living in the Chico and Medford metros is within 3% of each other (BEA Regional Price Parities), so neither is meaningfully cheaper.
- Which has higher household income, Chico or Medford?
- Medford has the higher median household income — $74,653 versus $65,221 (U.S. Census Bureau, ACS), about 14% more.
- Does a paycheck go further in Chico or Medford?
- A paycheck stretches further in Medford. Adjusted for local prices, the median income is worth $73,598 there versus $64,450 in Chico.
- Which has cheaper rent, Chico or Medford?
- Medford has cheaper rent — a median of $1,369/mo versus $1,446/mo (U.S. Census Bureau, ACS).