Policy Pulse 3.4.2024

Remote Work Economy: How Does Fort Worth Stack Up?

Last month, SmartAsset released a report on the prevalence of remote work across the United States. With data on more than 340 different American cities and their remote workforce, it offers an opportunity for Fort Worth to benchmark itself against comparable communities across Texas and the rest of the United States.

According to the U.S. Census, the average one-way commute time in large cities is 25 minutes, meaning remote workers could save roughly four hours in a five-day work week by not commuting. In an average city, 15.7% of workers are remote, per SmartAsset. How does Fort Worth compare?

Texas

Within the Lone Star State, Fort Worth comes in at No. 17 with 15.3% of its workforce working remotely, just a bit below the national average. Besides Austin (No. 3, 30.7%), the cities that topped the list are largely suburban communities near the state’s largest cities – Frisco (No. 1, 39.7%), Allen (No. 2, 33.2%), Plano (No. 4, 29.4%), Round Rock (No. 5, 27.2%), The Woodlands (No. 6, 26%), etc. Austin and Dallas were the only large cities in Texas (more than 500,000 in population) with a higher rate of remote workers than Fort Worth.

In terms of raw numbers of remote workers in Texas, here are the Top 5:

1. Austin – 181,680
2. Houston – 142,374
3. Dallas – 110,249
4. San Antonio – 97,710
5. Fort Worth – 72,190

United States

How does Fort Worth compare to similarly sized cities across the United States? Fort Worth is one of 10 American cities between 700,000 and 1,000,000 residents per 2022 U.S. Census estimates. Among those 10, Fort Worth ranks 8^th in share of remote workers at 15.3%, ahead of Indianapolis (14.2%) and Oklahoma City (11.7%). In contrast, Fort Worth has the second longest average commute among the 10 cities at 26.9 minutes, trailing only San Francisco (29.5 minutes).

Takeaways

There are likely pros and cons to having a large share of remote workers, something each community will need to balance according to its specific needs. On one hand, remote work opportunities are attractive to Gen Z workers, they save workers from long commutes in large cities, and offer job opportunities to residents even if employment is relatively unavailable where they live. On the other hand, cities with too large a share of remote workers may risk declining commercial property values, and many remote workers are being called back into the office by their employers which could complicate some existing remote work arrangements.

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National

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State and Local

• Morning News | Texas commercial property foreclosure filings are soaring
• Fort Worth Magazine | The City of Fort Worth Touts Multi-Million Dollar Impact Due to Film Industry
• City of Fort Worth | Homelessness workshop explores strategies to combat its impact
• Fort Worth Report | Fort Worth looks to convert office buildings as solution to its affordable housing crisis
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• Fort Worth Report | Layoffs tick up in Tarrant County, but economists say job market remains strong

Upcoming Dates

• March 5: Early voting concludes [More info]
• March 5: Fort Worth City Council Work Session, 1 p.m. at City Hall
• March 5: Tarrant County Commissioners Court, 10 a.m. at G.K Maenius Administration Building
• April 9: Leaders in Government: Public Safety, 8 a.m. at PalmWood [More info]
• April 30 – May 2: D.C. Fly-in presented by Lockheed Martin[More info]