More workers are traveling farther for jobs

Commutes are getting longer.

From 2000 to 2012, the number of jobs within the typical commute distance in metropolitan areas decreased 7% in the U.S., according to a recent Brookings Institution study, meaning more people are traveling farther to get to work.

Makenna Smith knows this well. She swapped a 15minute commute for a twoto three-hour ordeal when she moved to Riverside a few months ago. Her restaurant job is in Irvine, so the 20year-old has to leave at least two hours before her shift starts to make sure she gets there on time.

“If I could do it all over again, I would have found a job out here,” Smith said. “I could have even gotten a fast-food job just to hold me over, and it probably would have been more worth it than commuting.”

There could be more job opportunities closer to Smith’s home.

The Brookings report focused on job proximity, or the number of jobs that people live near. Only 29 of the nation’s largest 96 metro areas experienced net job gains and improved average employment proximity over those 12 years.

Two of these areas were in Southern California: the Inland Empire and Ventura County.

The Riverside-San Bernardino-Ontario area had a 9.8% increase in job proximity with 126,418 jobs in 2012, up from 115,127 in 2000.

Oxnard-Thousand Oaks- Ventura was right behind, with a 9.5% increase, adding about 4,000 jobs since 2000 for a total of 46,806 in 2012.

The southern Texas region of McAllen-EdinburgMission topped the list with a 57.5% increase in jobs, from 31,390 in 2000 to 49,434 in 2012.

The Cleveland, Detroit and Dayton, Ohio, metropolitan areas had the largest decreases in job proximity. All three regions saw the average number of nearby jobs decrease since 2000.

City residents saw a 3% decrease in nearby jobs while suburban residents saw a 7% decrease. But study co-author Natalie Holmes said the findings should not be generalized simply based on location. For example, part of San Bernardino lost jobs despite the region’s overall increase.

“Though jobs and people are suburbanizing, it’s not happening evenly,” she said. “It’s not a homogenous story.”

The report used U.S. census data to determine job proximity and stemmed from earlier studies on suburban poverty.

Though proximity does not necessarily guarantee employment, people who live closer to jobs are more likely to work, and also spend less time searching for jobs, the study said.

The decline in nearby jobs disproportionately affects poor and minority suburban residents, who moved to the suburbs in the 2000s and have lower employment rates and wages than whites or residents who aren’t poor, according to the study.

Additional constraints include transportation options or access to services such as child care, which can make a job seeker’s search area smaller, the study said.