$100 in 1948 is worth $810 in 2005,
because prices increased 710.4% over that period, an average of
3.74% a year.
$100 in 1948 has
the same buying power as
$810
in 2005
Detailed inflation statistics
Cumulative price change
710.4%
Average inflation rate
3.74% per year
Converted amount ($100 base)
$810
Price difference ($100 base)
$710
CPI in 1948
24.1
CPI in 2005
195.3
Inflation in 1948
8.07%
Inflation in 2005
3.39%
$100 in 1948 → 2005
$810
$100 in 2005 → 1948
$12.34
What happened to prices between 1948 and 2005
Between 1948 and 2005, the Consumer Price Index went from 24.1 to 195.3.
Cumulatively, prices increased 710.4%, which works out to an average of
3.74% per year. Put differently, a dollar in 1948 bought what
$0.12 buys in 2005: the 1948 dollar
lost 87.7% of its purchasing power over
these 57 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 2005 at the same ratio, 8.10: $1,000 becomes
$8,104, and $10,000 becomes $81,037.
Amount in 1948
Value in 2005
$1.00
$8.10
$5.00
$40.52
$10.00
$81.04
$20.00
$162
$50.00
$405
$100
$810
$500
$4,052
$1,000
$8,104
$5,000
$40,519
$10,000
$81,037
$100,000
$810,373
$1,000,000
$8,103,734
Inflation by spending category, 1948–2005
Between 1948 and 2005, medical care rose the most, up 2144.4%, while apparel rose the least, up 181.2%, against 710.4% for all items. The headline number is an average; here is what $100 of 1948
spending costs in 2005, by category:
Category
Avg. yearly inflation
$100 in 1948 →
All items (CPI-U)
3.74%
$810
Medical care
5.61%
$2,244
Transportation
3.81%
$844
Food
3.55%
$731
Apparel
1.83%
$281
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 2005
Prices climbed fastest in the 1970s, averaging 7.82% a year, and slowest in the 1940s (0.00% a year). Each step below chains into the full 1948–2005 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
1970–1980
7.82%
112.4%
$342
1980–1990
4.72%
58.6%
$542
1990–2000
2.80%
31.8%
$715
2000–2005
2.55%
13.4%
$810
Year by year: CPI and the value of $100 from 1948
$100 from 1948 had already become $236 by
1976, on its way to $810 in 2005; 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: 2005
In 2005, prices rose 3.4% and $100 from 1948 had the buying
power of $810; the year's average CPI of 195.3 is the level
behind every 2005 figure on this page.
Inflation rose to 3.4% in 2005, up from 2.7% in 2004, as gasoline averaged $2.30 a gallon,
compared with $1.88 the year before. Hurricane Katrina made landfall on August 29, and with
Hurricane Rita weeks later it disrupted Gulf Coast refining, pushing the national average
price past $3 in early September. The Federal Reserve raised its policy rate at every meeting,
from 2.25% to 4.25%, to keep energy costs from feeding into other prices. The median household
earned about $46,300, up 4.5% from 2004, but the median new home price rose a further 9%, to
$240,900. In April, Congress passed a bankruptcy law that made it harder to clear debts. A
first-class stamp stayed at 37 cents until January 2006, and the federal minimum wage stayed
at $5.15.
MLA: “Inflation from 1948 to 2005: $100 is worth $810 today.” InflationCalculator.com, U.S. Bureau of Labor Statistics CPI-U data, https://inflationcalculator.com/inflation/1948-to-2005/
APA: InflationCalculator.com. Inflation from 1948 to 2005. Based on U.S. Bureau of Labor Statistics CPI-U data. Retrieved from https://inflationcalculator.com/inflation/1948-to-2005/