$100 in 1949 is worth $640 in 1995,
because prices increased 540.3% over that period, an average of
4.12% a year.
$100 in 1949 has
the same buying power as
$640
in 1995
Detailed inflation statistics
Cumulative price change
540.3%
Average inflation rate
4.12% per year
Converted amount ($100 base)
$640
Price difference ($100 base)
$540
CPI in 1949
23.8
CPI in 1995
152.4
Inflation in 1949
-1.24%
Inflation in 1995
2.83%
$100 in 1949 → 1995
$640
$100 in 1995 → 1949
$15.62
What happened to prices between 1949 and 1995
Between 1949 and 1995, the Consumer Price Index went from 23.8 to 152.4.
Cumulatively, prices increased 540.3%, which works out to an average of
4.12% per year. Put differently, a dollar in 1949 bought what
$0.16 buys in 1995: the 1949 dollar
lost 84.4% of its purchasing power over
these 46 years.
Consumer prices fell 1.2% in 1949, down from 1948’s 8.1%
gain and the first annual decline since 1939, the first real break in a
decade otherwise defined by wartime and postwar inflation. A mild recession
drove the drop: the National Bureau of Economic Research dates a downturn
from November 1948 to October 1949, as businesses worked off inventories
built up during the postwar buying boom and price pressure finally eased.
The Cold War hardened around the same time. On April 4, the United States,
Canada, and ten Western European nations signed the North Atlantic Treaty,
committing to treat an attack on one member as an attack on all and
formalizing the Western alliance against Soviet expansion. That August 29,
the Soviet Union tested its first atomic bomb, ending the American nuclear
monopoly just four years after Hiroshima and Nagasaki and setting off an
arms race that would run for decades. Congress closed out the decade’s wage
policy that October, passing the Fair Labor Standards Amendments of 1949 to
raise the federal minimum wage to 75 cents an hour effective the following
January, nearly double the 40 cents that had held since 1945. The decade
closed with consumer prices 140.4% above their 1913 level,
up 70% since 1940 alone even after 1949’s decline.
First-class postage held at 3 cents.
Every 1949 amount converts to 1995 at the same ratio, 6.40: $1,000 becomes
$6,403, and $10,000 becomes $64,034.
Amount in 1949
Value in 1995
$1.00
$6.40
$5.00
$32.02
$10.00
$64.03
$20.00
$128
$50.00
$320
$100
$640
$500
$3,202
$1,000
$6,403
$5,000
$32,017
$10,000
$64,034
$100,000
$640,336
$1,000,000
$6,403,361
Inflation by spending category, 1949–1995
Between 1949 and 1995, medical care rose the most, up 1389.9%, while apparel rose the least, up 223.5%, against 540.3% for all items. The headline number is an average; here is what $100 of 1949
spending costs in 1995, by category:
Category
Avg. yearly inflation
$100 in 1949 →
All items (CPI-U)
4.12%
$640
Medical care
6.05%
$1,490
Transportation
4.08%
$629
Food
3.95%
$594
Apparel
2.59%
$324
Not shown because the BLS began these indexes after 1949: core (all items less food & energy) (1957–), energy (1957–), housing (1967–), recreation (1993–), education & communication (1993–).
Decade by decade: 1949 to 1995
Prices climbed fastest in the 1970s, averaging 7.82% a year, and slowest in the 1940s (1.26% a year). Each step below chains into the full 1949–1995 change:
Years
Avg. yearly inflation
Price change
$100 from 1949, at end
1949–1950
1.26%
1.3%
$101
1950–1960
2.08%
22.8%
$124
1960–1970
2.74%
31.1%
$163
1970–1980
7.82%
112.4%
$346
1980–1990
4.72%
58.6%
$549
1990–1995
3.12%
16.6%
$640
Year by year: CPI and the value of $100 from 1949
$100 from 1949 had already become $170 by
1971, on its way to $640 in 1995; 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 0.4% in 1955, the deepest deflation of the period.
Long periods are sampled every 2 years; the calculator above covers any pair of years.
The destination year: 1995
In 1995, prices rose 2.8% and $100 from 1949 had the buying
power of $640; the year's average CPI of 152.4 is the level
behind every 1995 figure on this page.
In 1995, gas averaged $1.15 a gallon, a new home cost roughly $133,900, and the median household
earned about $34,100. Inflation ran at 2.8% for the year, little changed from 1994, as the
Federal Reserve shifted from raising rates to cutting them. Having lifted its policy rate six
times the year before, the Fed judged by July that the economy had cooled enough on its own, and
trimmed rates instead, an outcome economists would later point to as a rare soft landing. The
year opened with a currency crisis: Mexico’s peso lost roughly half its value against the dollar
in a matter of weeks, and the U.S. Treasury and the IMF assembled a $50 billion rescue package,
controversial in Congress, to stabilize it and keep the crisis from spreading to other emerging
markets. Closer to home, a budget standoff between President Clinton and the Republican Congress
shut down federal agencies twice, first for five days in November and then for 21 days spanning
December into January 1996, the longest shutdown up to that point. The Postal Service raised the
cost of a first-class stamp to 32 cents in January. Low, steady inflation was about the only calm
part of 1995’s economic story.
MLA: “Inflation from 1949 to 1995: $100 is worth $640 today.” InflationCalculator.com, U.S. Bureau of Labor Statistics CPI-U data, https://inflationcalculator.com/inflation/1949-to-1995/
APA: InflationCalculator.com. Inflation from 1949 to 1995. Based on U.S. Bureau of Labor Statistics CPI-U data. Retrieved from https://inflationcalculator.com/inflation/1949-to-1995/