Cost of Living
per year
per month
How York's prices compare to the US city average across major spending categories.
How far does your salary go in York?
Your $100,000 in York has the same purchasing power as $109,625 in the average US city. You'd need $9,625 less here to maintain that standard of living.
Demographics and workforce data from the US Census ACS 5-Year.
bachelor's or higher
Climate, safety, and walkability indicators.
See a side-by-side breakdown of cost of living, housing, and salaries.
Popular comparisons
Sorted by affordability — most affordable first.
Within 10 points of York's cost index of 91, sorted by closest match.
York has a handful of real selling points, and they're not the kind of thing you find in a brochure. Your dollar carries more weight here and genuinely walkable, not just walkable-on-paper are the headliners, plus 2 more things worth knowing. The rest is below.
The composite cost-of-living index lands at 91, a comfortable 9% under the US norm. It shows up most clearly in housing, which is where the gap to coastal metros usually opens up. Median rent in town runs about $943/mo against a typical household income of $42,351, which is the kind of ratio that leaves room to save.
With a Walk Score of 90/100, York is in the category where car ownership becomes a real choice rather than the default. Errands work on foot, the city's built dense enough that things are actually close together, and the parking-and-gas budget can quietly disappear.
Bike Score of 91/100 in York. That puts it in the small group of US cities where you can do groceries, commute, and run errands on a bike without it being a feat of urban survival.
Average commute time in York runs around 23 minutes one-way — short enough that it doesn't restructure your day. Compared to the 45-plus-minute commutes that are normal in major metros, the difference adds up to a real lifestyle gap.
Reasons are pulled from York's actual data — Census ACS, BLS, BEA, NOAA, EPA AQS, FBI, and Walk Score. We don't list positives that aren't supported by the numbers, which is why different cities show different sections.
York gets a handful of meaningful snow days each year. Winters average about 27°F — cold enough for several inches at a time, warm enough for everything to melt between storms.
A real winter, but not a punishing one. York averages roughly 27°F in winter, with the coldest mornings dipping into the single digits a few times a year and most days landing somewhere between "chilly" and "actually cold".
Reliably warm. York's summer averages around 87°F, the kind of heat where you remember to leave the house before noon for outdoor things and accept that the back of your shirt will be wet by lunchtime.
York falls in roughly USDA Zone 8. The zone classification is based on average annual minimum temperatures, so it's the right lookup for whether perennials and trees will overwinter here. Note that this is approximate from our winter-temperature data — check the USDA map for the exact zone before betting an expensive plant on it.
Around 361 feet (110 m) above sea level — flat enough that nothing about York's altitude shows up in daily life.
Middle of the pack. York comes in around 3,292 per 100,000, basically the national average. The interesting question is usually which neighborhood, not which city — that's where the real variation lives.
It's a middle-of-the-road US city on cost. York's index of 91 sits within a few points of the national average — your money buys roughly what it would in a typical American metro.
Yes, by US standards it's extraordinary. York scores 90/100, one of the highest in the country. Transit Score is 48 out of 100. Living here without a car isn't just possible; for many residents it's the default.
As a rule of thumb, plan on about $63,854 to live in York the way a $70,000 earner lives in a typical US city. The math gets less forgiving the lower you go below that. Median rent in York runs about $943/mo — keeping housing under 30% of gross income points to a similar floor on what you'd want to earn.