$100 in 1951 is worth $825 in 2009,
because prices increased 725.1% over that period, an average of
3.71% a year.
$100 in 1951 has
the same buying power as
$825
in 2009
Detailed inflation statistics
Cumulative price change
725.1%
Average inflation rate
3.71% per year
Converted amount ($100 base)
$825
Price difference ($100 base)
$725
CPI in 1951
26
CPI in 2009
214.537
Inflation in 1951
7.88%
Inflation in 2009
-0.36%
$100 in 1951 → 2009
$825
$100 in 2009 → 1951
$12.12
What happened to prices between 1951 and 2009
Between 1951 and 2009, the Consumer Price Index went from 26 to 214.537.
Cumulatively, prices increased 725.1%, which works out to an average of
3.71% per year. Put differently, a dollar in 1951 bought what
$0.12 buys in 2009: the 1951 dollar
lost 87.9% of its purchasing power over
these 58 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 2009 at the same ratio, 8.25: $1,000 becomes
$8,251, and $10,000 becomes $82,514.
Amount in 1951
Value in 2009
$1.00
$8.25
$5.00
$41.26
$10.00
$82.51
$20.00
$165
$50.00
$413
$100
$825
$500
$4,126
$1,000
$8,251
$5,000
$41,257
$10,000
$82,514
$100,000
$825,142
$1,000,000
$8,251,423
Inflation by spending category, 1951–2009
Between 1951 and 2009, medical care rose the most, up 2262.3%, while apparel rose the least, up 173.5%, against 725.1% for all items. The headline number is an average; here is what $100 of 1951
spending costs in 2009, by category:
Category
Avg. yearly inflation
$100 in 1951 →
All items (CPI-U)
3.71%
$825
Medical care
5.60%
$2,362
Food
3.59%
$773
Transportation
3.52%
$744
Apparel
1.75%
$274
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–).
Decade by decade: 1951 to 2009
Prices climbed fastest in the 1970s, averaging 7.82% a year, and slowest in the 1950s (1.45% a year). Each step below chains into the full 1951–2009 change:
Years
Avg. yearly inflation
Price change
$100 from 1951, at end
1951–1960
1.45%
13.8%
$114
1960–1970
2.74%
31.1%
$149
1970–1980
7.82%
112.4%
$317
1980–1990
4.72%
58.6%
$503
1990–2000
2.80%
31.8%
$662
2000–2009
2.47%
24.6%
$825
Year by year: CPI and the value of $100 from 1951
$100 from 1951 had already become $279 by
1979, on its way to $825 in 2009; 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: 2009
In 2009, prices fell 0.4% and $100 from 1951 had the buying
power of $825; the year's average CPI of 214.537 is the level
behind every 2009 figure on this page.
2009 is the rarest kind of year in the modern price data: one where the cost
of living went down. The CPI fell 0.4%, the first full-year deflation
since 1955, as the Great Recession hollowed out demand and oil unwound from
its $147 spike the summer before. Gasoline that had cost over $4 a gallon in
July 2008 averaged $2.35 in 2009, and that energy collapse dragged the
12-month inflation rate to −2.1% by July, the deepest reading since 1950.
Policymakers treated falling prices not as relief but as a warning: deflation
raises the real weight of debt precisely when households are drowning in it,
which is why the Federal Reserve pinned interest rates near zero, began buying
bonds by the hundreds of billions, and Washington passed a $787 billion
stimulus. The medicine took: prices stabilized within a year, and 2009 remains
the textbook case of why central banks fear deflation more than moderate
inflation.
MLA: “Inflation from 1951 to 2009: $100 is worth $825 today.” InflationCalculator.com, U.S. Bureau of Labor Statistics CPI-U data, https://inflationcalculator.com/inflation/1951-to-2009/
APA: InflationCalculator.com. Inflation from 1951 to 2009. Based on U.S. Bureau of Labor Statistics CPI-U data. Retrieved from https://inflationcalculator.com/inflation/1951-to-2009/