$100 in 1949 is worth $674 in 1997,
because prices increased 574.4% over that period, an average of
4.06% a year.
$100 in 1949 has
the same buying power as
$674
in 1997
Detailed inflation statistics
Cumulative price change
574.4%
Average inflation rate
4.06% per year
Converted amount ($100 base)
$674
Price difference ($100 base)
$574
CPI in 1949
23.8
CPI in 1997
160.5
Inflation in 1949
-1.24%
Inflation in 1997
2.29%
$100 in 1949 → 1997
$674
$100 in 1997 → 1949
$14.83
What happened to prices between 1949 and 1997
Between 1949 and 1997, the Consumer Price Index went from 23.8 to 160.5.
Cumulatively, prices increased 574.4%, which works out to an average of
4.06% per year. Put differently, a dollar in 1949 bought what
$0.15 buys in 1997: the 1949 dollar
lost 85.2% of its purchasing power over
these 48 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 1997 at the same ratio, 6.74: $1,000 becomes
$6,744, and $10,000 becomes $67,437.
Amount in 1949
Value in 1997
$1.00
$6.74
$5.00
$33.72
$10.00
$67.44
$20.00
$135
$50.00
$337
$100
$674
$500
$3,372
$1,000
$6,744
$5,000
$33,718
$10,000
$67,437
$100,000
$674,370
$1,000,000
$6,743,697
Inflation by spending category, 1949–1997
Between 1949 and 1997, medical care rose the most, up 1485.1%, while apparel rose the least, up 225.7%, against 574.4% for all items. The headline number is an average; here is what $100 of 1949
spending costs in 1997, by category:
Category
Avg. yearly inflation
$100 in 1949 →
All items (CPI-U)
4.06%
$674
Medical care
5.93%
$1,585
Transportation
3.99%
$653
Food
3.91%
$629
Apparel
2.49%
$326
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 1997
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 1949–1997 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
1990–1997
2.98%
22.8%
$674
Year by year: CPI and the value of $100 from 1949
$100 from 1949 had already become $187 by
1973, on its way to $674 in 1997; 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: 1997
In 1997, prices rose 2.3% and $100 from 1949 had the buying
power of $674; the year's average CPI of 160.5 is the level
behind every 1997 figure on this page.
The median household earned about $37,000 in 1997, gas averaged $1.23 a gallon, and a new home
cost roughly $146,000. Inflation ran at 2.3% for the year, its lowest reading since the
mid-1980s, as a strong dollar and falling import prices helped keep costs in check at home even
as trouble built abroad. In July, Thailand devalued the baht, and the currency collapse that
followed spread within months to Indonesia, South Korea, and other Southeast Asian economies,
forcing IMF bailouts and years of recession across the region, though the crisis had little
immediate effect on U.S. prices. At home, Washington had a calmer year: in August, President
Clinton and Congress agreed on the Balanced Budget Act and the Taxpayer Relief Act, which cut
capital gains tax rates, created the Roth IRA, and set the federal budget on a path to its first
surplus in nearly three decades. In September, the federal minimum wage completed a two-step
rise to $5.15 an hour, where it would stay for a decade. Low inflation, a firming budget picture,
and a crisis unfolding an ocean away made 1997 a year the U.S. economy looked stronger than much
of the rest of the world’s.
MLA: “Inflation from 1949 to 1997: $100 is worth $674 today.” InflationCalculator.com, U.S. Bureau of Labor Statistics CPI-U data, https://inflationcalculator.com/inflation/1949-to-1997/
APA: InflationCalculator.com. Inflation from 1949 to 1997. Based on U.S. Bureau of Labor Statistics CPI-U data. Retrieved from https://inflationcalculator.com/inflation/1949-to-1997/