$100 in 1948 is worth $271 in 1978,
because prices increased 170.5% over that period, an average of
3.37% a year.
$100 in 1948 has
the same buying power as
$271
in 1978
Detailed inflation statistics
Cumulative price change
170.5%
Average inflation rate
3.37% per year
Converted amount ($100 base)
$271
Price difference ($100 base)
$171
CPI in 1948
24.1
CPI in 1978
65.2
Inflation in 1948
8.07%
Inflation in 1978
7.59%
$100 in 1948 → 1978
$271
$100 in 1978 → 1948
$36.96
What happened to prices between 1948 and 1978
Between 1948 and 1978, the Consumer Price Index went from 24.1 to 65.2.
Cumulatively, prices increased 170.5%, which works out to an average of
3.37% per year. Put differently, a dollar in 1948 bought what
$0.37 buys in 1978: the 1948 dollar
lost 63.0% of its purchasing power over
these 30 years.
Consumer prices rose 8.1% in 1948, down slightly from 1947’s
14.4% but still the second straight year of sharp postwar inflation now
that wartime price controls were fully gone. Congress moved to stabilize a
different economy that April, passing the Economic Cooperation Act to fund
the plan Secretary of State George Marshall had proposed the year before:
more than $13 billion over four years to rebuild Western Europe and counter
Soviet influence. The Cold War turned tense closer to the plan’s target
that June, when Soviet forces cut off road and rail access to the
Western-controlled sectors of Berlin. American and British aircraft
responded almost immediately with an airlift of food, fuel, and supplies
that would keep the city running for nearly a year. Domestic politics
produced its own upset that November: nearly every poll and pundit had
predicted a Republican win, but Harry Truman defeated New York Governor
Thomas Dewey, handing the Chicago Tribune its famously wrong “Dewey Defeats
Truman” headline. Consumer prices finished the year 143.4% above their
1913 level and 40.9% above 1929’s
pre-Depression peak. First-class postage held at 3 cents, and the minimum
wage stayed at 40 cents an hour.
Every 1948 amount converts to 1978 at the same ratio, 2.71: $1,000 becomes
$2,705, and $10,000 becomes $27,054.
Amount in 1948
Value in 1978
$1.00
$2.71
$5.00
$13.53
$10.00
$27.05
$20.00
$54.11
$50.00
$135
$100
$271
$500
$1,353
$1,000
$2,705
$5,000
$13,527
$10,000
$27,054
$100,000
$270,539
$1,000,000
$2,705,394
Inflation by spending category, 1948–1978
Between 1948 and 1978, medical care rose the most, up 329.2%, while apparel rose the least, up 91.5%, against 170.5% for all items. The headline number is an average; here is what $100 of 1948
spending costs in 1978, by category:
Category
Avg. yearly inflation
$100 in 1948 →
All items (CPI-U)
3.37%
$271
Medical care
4.98%
$429
Transportation
3.72%
$300
Food
3.44%
$276
Apparel
2.19%
$192
Not shown because the BLS began these indexes after 1948: core (all items less food & energy) (1957–), energy (1957–), housing (1967–), recreation (1993–), education & communication (1993–).
Decade by decade: 1948 to 1978
Prices climbed fastest in the 1970s, averaging 6.70% a year, and slowest in the 1940s (0.00% a year). Each step below chains into the full 1948–1978 change:
Years
Avg. yearly inflation
Price change
$100 from 1948, at end
1948–1950
0.00%
0.0%
$100
1950–1960
2.08%
22.8%
$123
1960–1970
2.74%
31.1%
$161
1970–1978
6.70%
68.0%
$271
Year by year: CPI and the value of $100 from 1948
$100 from 1948 had already become $127 by
1963, on its way to $271 in 1978; each row shows the CPI, that
year's inflation rate, and the running value.
Within the span, inflation peaked at 11.0% in 1974, and prices fell 1.2% in 1949, the deepest deflation of the period.
In 1978, prices rose 7.6% and $100 from 1948 had the buying
power of $271; the year's average CPI of 65.2 is the level
behind every 1978 figure on this page.
Consumer prices rose 7.6% in 1978, accelerating for a second straight year as
rising wages, a weakening dollar, and climbing energy costs outpaced the
Federal Reserve’s response. Fed chairman G. William Miller, appointed by
Carter that March, kept interest rates too low to slow the trend, a policy
later cited as one reason inflation kept building toward the following year’s
crisis. California voters responded to their own version of the problem that
June, passing Proposition 13 by nearly two to one to cap property tax rates
after years of rising home values had pushed tax bills up alongside them.
Foreign policy delivered one of the decade’s genuine breakthroughs: President
Carter brought Egyptian President Anwar Sadat and Israeli Prime Minister
Menachem Begin together for thirteen days of negotiations at Camp David that
September, producing a framework for peace between the two countries that was
signed as a treaty the following March. First-class postage rose to 15 cents
that May 29, a rate that would hold longer than any other in the decade. The
year ended in tragedy: cult leader Jim Jones directed the mass murder-suicide
of more than 900 followers at a remote settlement in Guyana that November 18.
A median household earned $15,064 in 1978, a new home sold for a median
$55,700, and gas averaged 63 cents a gallon. Consumer prices stood 558.6%
above their 1913 level, with the decade’s worst inflation
still to come.
MLA: “Inflation from 1948 to 1978: $100 is worth $271 today.” InflationCalculator.com, U.S. Bureau of Labor Statistics CPI-U data, https://inflationcalculator.com/inflation/1948-to-1978/
APA: InflationCalculator.com. Inflation from 1948 to 1978. Based on U.S. Bureau of Labor Statistics CPI-U data. Retrieved from https://inflationcalculator.com/inflation/1948-to-1978/