$100 in 1947 is worth $370 in 1980,
because prices increased 269.5% over that period, an average of
4.04% a year.
$100 in 1947 has
the same buying power as
$370
in 1980
Detailed inflation statistics
Cumulative price change
269.5%
Average inflation rate
4.04% per year
Converted amount ($100 base)
$370
Price difference ($100 base)
$270
CPI in 1947
22.3
CPI in 1980
82.4
Inflation in 1947
14.36%
Inflation in 1980
13.50%
$100 in 1947 → 1980
$370
$100 in 1980 → 1947
$27.06
What happened to prices between 1947 and 1980
Between 1947 and 1980, the Consumer Price Index went from 22.3 to 82.4.
Cumulatively, prices increased 269.5%, which works out to an average of
4.04% per year. Put differently, a dollar in 1947 bought what
$0.27 buys in 1980: the 1947 dollar
lost 72.9% of its purchasing power over
these 33 years.
Consumer prices rose 14.4% in 1947, up from 1946’s 8.3% and
the fastest annual increase since 1920, as the last of the wartime price
controls disappeared and a year of strikes, wage catch-up, and lingering
shortages hit consumers all at once. Congress answered the previous year’s
strike wave that June, overriding President Truman’s veto to pass the
Taft-Hartley Act, which banned secondary boycotts and the closed shop and
let states adopt “right-to-work” laws curbing union power. American
attention was also turning outward. In a June 5 speech at Harvard,
Secretary of State George Marshall outlined a U.S.-funded plan to rebuild
Western Europe’s economies, an effort that would become known as the
Marshall Plan once Congress funded it the following year. The government
reorganized itself for the confrontation with the Soviet Union that plan was
partly designed to prevent: the National Security Act, signed July 26,
created the Department of Defense, the Air Force as a separate service, the
Central Intelligence Agency, and the National Security Council. Consumer
prices stood 125.3% above their 1913 level and 30.4% above
1929’s pre-Depression peak, up from just 1.2% above it four
years earlier. First-class postage held at 3 cents, and the minimum wage
stayed at 40 cents an hour.
Every 1947 amount converts to 1980 at the same ratio, 3.70: $1,000 becomes
$3,695, and $10,000 becomes $36,951.
Amount in 1947
Value in 1980
$1.00
$3.70
$5.00
$18.48
$10.00
$36.95
$20.00
$73.90
$50.00
$185
$100
$370
$500
$1,848
$1,000
$3,695
$5,000
$18,475
$10,000
$36,951
$100,000
$369,507
$1,000,000
$3,695,067
Inflation by spending category, 1947–1980
Between 1947 and 1980, medical care rose the most, up 454.8%, while apparel rose the least, up 127.8%, against 269.5% for all items. The headline number is an average; here is what $100 of 1947
spending costs in 1980, by category:
Category
Avg. yearly inflation
$100 in 1947 →
All items (CPI-U)
4.04%
$370
Medical care
5.33%
$555
Transportation
4.66%
$449
Food
3.96%
$360
Apparel
2.53%
$228
Not shown because the BLS began these indexes after 1947: core (all items less food & energy) (1957–), energy (1957–), housing (1967–), recreation (1993–), education & communication (1993–).
Decade by decade: 1947 to 1980
Prices climbed fastest in the 1970s, averaging 7.82% a year, and slowest in the 1950s (2.08% a year). Each step below chains into the full 1947–1980 change:
Years
Avg. yearly inflation
Price change
$100 from 1947, at end
1947–1950
2.62%
8.1%
$108
1950–1960
2.08%
22.8%
$133
1960–1970
2.74%
31.1%
$174
1970–1980
7.82%
112.4%
$370
Year by year: CPI and the value of $100 from 1947
$100 from 1947 had already become $137 by
1963, on its way to $370 in 1980; each row shows the CPI, that
year's inflation rate, and the running value.
Within the span, inflation peaked at 13.5% in 1980, and prices fell 1.2% in 1949, the deepest deflation of the period.
Long periods are sampled every 2 years; the calculator above covers any pair of years.
The destination year: 1980
In 1980, prices rose 13.5% and $100 from 1947 had the buying
power of $370; the year's average CPI of 82.4 is the level
behind every 1980 figure on this page.
1980 sat at the very peak of the Great Inflation. Prices rose 13.5% in that
single year, mortgage rates were climbing toward 16%, and the Federal Reserve
under Paul Volcker was administering the painful interest-rate medicine that
would finally break the inflationary spiral, at the cost of the deep 1981–82
recession. No single year looms larger in how Americans think about inflation.
MLA: “Inflation from 1947 to 1980: $100 is worth $370 today.” InflationCalculator.com, U.S. Bureau of Labor Statistics CPI-U data, https://inflationcalculator.com/inflation/1947-to-1980/
APA: InflationCalculator.com. Inflation from 1947 to 1980. Based on U.S. Bureau of Labor Statistics CPI-U data. Retrieved from https://inflationcalculator.com/inflation/1947-to-1980/