Las Vegas vs St. Louis
Metro-area medians — Las Vegas-Henderson-North Las Vegas, NV Metro Area vs St. Louis, MO-IL Metro Area — not the cities proper.
St. Louis comes out ahead, winning 8 of the 8 clearly-decided measures.
St. Louis costs about 5% less to live in, and household incomes are similar. Adjusted for local prices, a typical paycheck stretches further in St. Louis.
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, St. Louis leaves you about $555/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 St. Louis for
- + Livability (CityLedger)
- + Cost of living (price level, US = 100)
- + Cost-adjusted income (pay's real value)
- + Median rent
- + Median home value
- + Unemployment
- + Bachelor's degree or higher
- + Air quality (median AQI)
Las Vegas vs St. Louis — frequently asked
- Is Las Vegas cheaper than St. Louis?
- St. Louis is cheaper: its overall cost of living runs about 5% below Las Vegas's (BEA Regional Price Parities).
- Which has higher household income, Las Vegas or St. Louis?
- Household incomes are similar — $80,028 in the Las Vegas metro versus $81,679 in St. Louis (U.S. Census Bureau, ACS).
- Does a paycheck go further in Las Vegas or St. Louis?
- A paycheck stretches further in St. Louis. Adjusted for local prices, the median income is worth $85,898 there versus $79,856 in Las Vegas.
- Which has cheaper rent, Las Vegas or St. Louis?
- St. Louis has cheaper rent — a median of $1,154/mo versus $1,739/mo (U.S. Census Bureau, ACS).