$100 in 1951 is worth $112 in 1959,
because prices increased 11.9% over that period, an average of
1.42% a year.
$100 in 1951 has
the same buying power as
$112
in 1959
Detailed inflation statistics
Cumulative price change
11.9%
Average inflation rate
1.42% per year
Converted amount ($100 base)
$112
Price difference ($100 base)
$11.92
CPI in 1951
26
CPI in 1959
29.1
Inflation in 1951
7.88%
Inflation in 1959
0.69%
$100 in 1951 → 1959
$112
$100 in 1959 → 1951
$89.35
What happened to prices between 1951 and 1959
Between 1951 and 1959, the Consumer Price Index went from 26 to 29.1.
Cumulatively, prices increased 11.9%, which works out to an average of
1.42% per year. Put differently, a dollar in 1951 bought what
$0.89 buys in 1959: the 1951 dollar
lost 10.7% of its purchasing power over
these 8 years.
Consumer prices rose 7.9% in 1951, up sharply from 1950’s
1.3% and the fastest increase since 1947, as Korean War buying and a
defense spending surge hit an economy still adjusting to peacetime. Much
of the jump came early in the year, before the government stepped in: the
Office of Price Stabilization imposed a general ceiling on prices January
26, and the Wage Stabilization Board froze wages soon after, the broadest
peacetime controls since the war began that June. The year’s more lasting
change came in monetary policy. On March 4, the Treasury and the Federal
Reserve signed the Accord, ending the Fed’s wartime obligation to hold
down interest rates on government bonds and freeing the central bank to
fight inflation on its own terms for the first time since 1942, a shift
that would shape Fed independence for decades. Congress raised taxes that
October to help pay for the war: the Revenue Act of 1951, signed October
20, lifted individual and corporate income taxes along with a range of
excise taxes, the third increase in taxes since fighting began in Korea.
Consumer prices finished 1951 162.6% above their 1913
level. First-class postage held at 3 cents, and the minimum wage stayed at
75 cents an hour.
Every 1951 amount converts to 1959 at the same ratio, 1.12: $1,000 becomes
$1,119, and $10,000 becomes $11,192.
Amount in 1951
Value in 1959
$1.00
$1.12
$5.00
$5.60
$10.00
$11.19
$20.00
$22.38
$50.00
$55.96
$100
$112
$500
$560
$1,000
$1,119
$5,000
$5,596
$10,000
$11,192
$100,000
$111,923
$1,000,000
$1,119,231
Inflation by spending category, 1951–1959
Between 1951 and 1959, medical care rose the most, up 35.2%, while apparel rose the least, up 2.5%, against 11.9% for all items. The headline number is an average; here is what $100 of 1951
spending costs in 1959, by category:
Category
Avg. yearly inflation
$100 in 1951 →
All items (CPI-U)
1.42%
$112
Medical care
3.84%
$135
Transportation
2.69%
$124
Food
0.65%
$105
Apparel
0.31%
$103
Not shown because the BLS began these indexes after 1951: core (all items less food & energy) (1957–), energy (1957–), housing (1967–), recreation (1993–), education & communication (1993–).
Year by year: CPI and the value of $100 from 1951
$100 from 1951 had already become $103 by
1955, on its way to $112 in 1959; each row shows the CPI, that
year's inflation rate, and the running value.
Within the span, inflation peaked at 3.3% in 1957, and prices fell 0.4% in 1955, the deepest deflation of the period.
In 1959, prices rose 0.7% and $100 from 1951 had the buying
power of $112; the year's average CPI of 29.1 is the level
behind every 1959 figure on this page.
Consumer prices rose 0.7% in 1959, down sharply from 1958’s
2.8% as the economy recovered briskly from the year before’s recession,
with output and employment both rebounding through the year. The map of
the country changed that year for the first time since 1912: Alaska
joined the union January 3, and Hawaii followed August 21, completing the
50-state United States. Ninety miles from Florida, Cuba changed hands
that January, when Fidel Castro’s guerrilla forces overthrew President
Fulgencio Batista, who fled the country on the 1st; Castro entered Havana
on the 8th, beginning a Communist government that would define Cold War
tensions in the hemisphere for decades. Labor and management fought their
longest battle of the postwar era that summer: the United Steelworkers
walked out July 15 in a dispute over work rules, the longest strike in the
industry’s history, before a federal court granted the Eisenhower
administration a Taft-Hartley back-to-work order that November. Consumer
prices finished the decade 193.9% above their 1913 level,
up 20.7% from where they stood in 1950. First-class
postage held at 4 cents, and the minimum wage stayed at $1.00 an hour.
MLA: “Inflation from 1951 to 1959: $100 is worth $112 today.” InflationCalculator.com, U.S. Bureau of Labor Statistics CPI-U data, https://inflationcalculator.com/inflation/1951-to-1959/
APA: InflationCalculator.com. Inflation from 1951 to 1959. Based on U.S. Bureau of Labor Statistics CPI-U data. Retrieved from https://inflationcalculator.com/inflation/1951-to-1959/