$100 in 1947 is worth $483 in 1985,
because prices increased 382.5% over that period, an average of
4.23% a year.
$100 in 1947 has
the same buying power as
$483
in 1985
Detailed inflation statistics
Cumulative price change
382.5%
Average inflation rate
4.23% per year
Converted amount ($100 base)
$483
Price difference ($100 base)
$383
CPI in 1947
22.3
CPI in 1985
107.6
Inflation in 1947
14.36%
Inflation in 1985
3.56%
$100 in 1947 → 1985
$483
$100 in 1985 → 1947
$20.72
What happened to prices between 1947 and 1985
Between 1947 and 1985, the Consumer Price Index went from 22.3 to 107.6.
Cumulatively, prices increased 382.5%, which works out to an average of
4.23% per year. Put differently, a dollar in 1947 bought what
$0.21 buys in 1985: the 1947 dollar
lost 79.3% of its purchasing power over
these 38 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 1985 at the same ratio, 4.83: $1,000 becomes
$4,825, and $10,000 becomes $48,251.
Amount in 1947
Value in 1985
$1.00
$4.83
$5.00
$24.13
$10.00
$48.25
$20.00
$96.50
$50.00
$241
$100
$483
$500
$2,413
$1,000
$4,825
$5,000
$24,126
$10,000
$48,251
$100,000
$482,511
$1,000,000
$4,825,112
Inflation by spending category, 1947–1985
Between 1947 and 1985, medical care rose the most, up 740.7%, while apparel rose the least, up 163.2%, against 382.5% for all items. The headline number is an average; here is what $100 of 1947
spending costs in 1985, by category:
Category
Avg. yearly inflation
$100 in 1947 →
All items (CPI-U)
4.23%
$483
Medical care
5.76%
$841
Transportation
4.71%
$575
Food
3.96%
$438
Apparel
2.58%
$263
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 1985
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 1947–1985 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
1980–1985
5.48%
30.6%
$483
Year by year: CPI and the value of $100 from 1947
$100 from 1947 had already become $141 by
1965, on its way to $483 in 1985; 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: 1985
In 1985, prices rose 3.6% and $100 from 1947 had the buying
power of $483; the year's average CPI of 107.6 is the level
behind every 1985 figure on this page.
By 1985, low inflation had become the norm rather than the exception.
Consumer prices rose 3.6% for the year, the fourth straight year in the
3-6% range following the double-digit spikes of 1980 and 1981, proof that
the disinflation had held rather than merely paused, as it had after
previous recessions. Overseas, the dollar had become a problem of its own:
years of high U.S. interest rates had pulled in foreign capital and pushed
the dollar’s value up so far that American exporters were losing business
abroad, widening the trade deficit. In September, the finance ministers of
the U.S., Japan, West Germany, France, and the United Kingdom met at New
York’s Plaza Hotel and agreed to coordinate a managed decline of the
dollar; it fell roughly 25% against major currencies over the following two
years. At home, Congress responded to a federal deficit that had roughly
tripled since 1980 by passing the Gramm-Rudman-Hollings Act in December,
setting binding targets to shrink the deficit with automatic
across-the-board cuts if lawmakers missed them. Households felt the calmer
economy in small ways: first-class postage rose to 22 cents in February,
its first increase since November 1981, after nearly four years at 20
cents.
MLA: “Inflation from 1947 to 1985: $100 is worth $483 today.” InflationCalculator.com, U.S. Bureau of Labor Statistics CPI-U data, https://inflationcalculator.com/inflation/1947-to-1985/
APA: InflationCalculator.com. Inflation from 1947 to 1985. Based on U.S. Bureau of Labor Statistics CPI-U data. Retrieved from https://inflationcalculator.com/inflation/1947-to-1985/