pinning in the entire sample is necessary to enhance J$_{c}$ ( B ) and to improve the conductor. In summary we have derived a practical equation, which bridges theory and experiment by relating the (local) dependence of the critical current density on the magnetic induction J$_{c}$ ( B ) to the thickness dependence of the average critical current density at zero applied field J$_{sf}$ ( d ). Solutions of the equation correctly predict the thickness dependence for two common J$_{c}$ ( B ) models and excellent agreement is reached by fitting a single pre-factor. Thus the influence of J$_{c}$ ( B ) on the measured J$_{sf}$ ( d ) in transport experiments can be quantified, which is technologically important, because it allows investigating the depression of the critical current density observed in coated conductors when they are grown to higher thicknesses. ∗ hengstb@ati.ac.at 1 A. Mogro-Campero, L. G. Turner, E. L. Hall, N. Lewis, L. A. Peluso, and W. E. Balz, Super- cond. Sci. Technol. 3 , 62 (1990). 2 S. R. Foltyn, P. Tiwari, R. C. Dye, M. Q. Le, and X. D. Wu, Appl. Phys. Lett. 63 , 1848 (1993). 3 S. R. Foltyn, Q. X. Jia, P. N. Arendt, L. Kinder, Y. Fan, and J. F. Smith, Appl. Phys. Lett. 75 , 3692 (1999). 4 S. R. Foltyn, P. N. Arendt, Q. X. Jia, H. Wang, J. L. MacManus-Driscoll, S. Kreiskott, R. F. DePaula, L. Stan, J. R. Groves, and P. C. Dowden, Appl. Phys. Lett. 82 , 4519 (2003). 5 A. O. Ijaduola, J. R. Thompson, R. Feenstra, D. K. Christen, A. A. Gapud, and X. Song, Phys. Rev. B 73 , 134502 (2006). 6 L. Rostila, J. Lehtonen, and R. Mikkonen, Physica C 451 , 66 (2007). 7 F. Hengstberger, M. Eisterer, and H. W. Weber arXiv:0912.1979v1 [cond-mat.supr-con]. 8 E. H. Brandt and M. Indenbom, Phys. Rev. B 48 , 12893 (1993). 7