$100 in 1949 is worth $995 in 2014,
because prices increased 894.7% over that period, an average of
3.60% a year.
$100 in 1949 has
the same buying power as
$995
in 2014
Detailed inflation statistics
Cumulative price change
894.7%
Average inflation rate
3.60% per year
Converted amount ($100 base)
$995
Price difference ($100 base)
$895
CPI in 1949
23.8
CPI in 2014
236.736
Inflation in 1949
-1.24%
Inflation in 2014
1.62%
$100 in 1949 → 2014
$995
$100 in 2014 → 1949
$10.05
What happened to prices between 1949 and 2014
Between 1949 and 2014, the Consumer Price Index went from 23.8 to 236.736.
Cumulatively, prices increased 894.7%, which works out to an average of
3.60% per year. Put differently, a dollar in 1949 bought what
$0.10 buys in 2014: the 1949 dollar
lost 89.9% of its purchasing power over
these 65 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 2014 at the same ratio, 9.95: $1,000 becomes
$9,947, and $10,000 becomes $99,469.
Amount in 1949
Value in 2014
$1.00
$9.95
$5.00
$49.73
$10.00
$99.47
$20.00
$199
$50.00
$497
$100
$995
$500
$4,973
$1,000
$9,947
$5,000
$49,734
$10,000
$99,469
$100,000
$994,689
$1,000,000
$9,946,891
Inflation by spending category, 1949–2014
Between 1949 and 2014, medical care rose the most, up 2841.2%, while apparel rose the least, up 212.5%, against 894.7% for all items. The headline number is an average; here is what $100 of 1949
spending costs in 2014, by category:
Category
Avg. yearly inflation
$100 in 1949 →
All items (CPI-U)
3.60%
$995
Medical care
5.34%
$2,941
Transportation
3.57%
$977
Food
3.56%
$971
Apparel
1.77%
$313
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 2014
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 1949–2014 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
1990–2000
2.80%
31.8%
$724
2000–2010
2.39%
26.6%
$916
2010–2014
2.08%
8.6%
$995
Year by year: CPI and the value of $100 from 1949
$100 from 1949 had already become $305 by
1979, on its way to $995 in 2014; 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 5 years; the calculator above covers any pair of years.
The destination year: 2014
In 2014, prices rose 1.6% and $100 from 1949 had the buying
power of $995; the year's average CPI of 236.736 is the level
behind every 2014 figure on this page.
2014 ended with the sharpest oil price drop in years. Consumer prices rose
1.6% for the year, close to 2013’s pace, but the annual figure hid a shift at
the pump: crude oil fell from above $100 a barrel in June to below $60 in
December, and gasoline finished the year near $2.25 a gallon after averaging
$3.37 across 2014. The drop reflected record U.S. shale output, softer
global demand, and OPEC’s decision in November to keep producing.
For households, cheaper fuel arrived just as the labor market strengthened.
Median household income was $53,657, essentially flat on the prior year, and
the median new home sold for about $288,500. The federal minimum wage stayed
at $7.25 for a fifth year, and a first-class stamp rose to 49 cents.
The Federal Reserve ended its bond purchases in October but left its policy
rate at zero. A stronger dollar helped hold down import prices. Because
energy weighs heavily in the CPI, the late-year slide carried into 2015, which
posted the smallest annual increase of the decade.
MLA: “Inflation from 1949 to 2014: $100 is worth $995 today.” InflationCalculator.com, U.S. Bureau of Labor Statistics CPI-U data, https://inflationcalculator.com/inflation/1949-to-2014/
APA: InflationCalculator.com. Inflation from 1949 to 2014. Based on U.S. Bureau of Labor Statistics CPI-U data. Retrieved from https://inflationcalculator.com/inflation/1949-to-2014/