$100 in 1952 is worth $168 in 1973,
because prices increased 67.5% over that period, an average of
2.49% a year.
$100 in 1952 has
the same buying power as
$168
in 1973
Detailed inflation statistics
Cumulative price change
67.5%
Average inflation rate
2.49% per year
Converted amount ($100 base)
$168
Price difference ($100 base)
$67.55
CPI in 1952
26.5
CPI in 1973
44.4
Inflation in 1952
1.92%
Inflation in 1973
6.22%
$100 in 1952 → 1973
$168
$100 in 1973 → 1952
$59.68
What happened to prices between 1952 and 1973
Between 1952 and 1973, the Consumer Price Index went from 26.5 to 44.4.
Cumulatively, prices increased 67.5%, which works out to an average of
2.49% per year. Put differently, a dollar in 1952 bought what
$0.60 buys in 1973: the 1952 dollar
lost 40.3% of its purchasing power over
these 21 years.
Consumer prices rose 1.9% in 1952, down sharply from 1951’s
7.9% as the price and wage controls imposed the year before held the cost
of living in check even with the Korean War still underway. Labor strife
tested those controls that spring: to head off a strike that could have
disrupted war production, President Truman ordered the government to
seize the steel industry that April, over the objections of steel
companies fighting the price the Office of Price Stabilization had set for
their product. The Supreme Court ruled the seizure unconstitutional in
Youngstown Sheet & Tube Co. v. Sawyer that June, a landmark limit on
presidential power, and steelworkers then struck for 53 days before a
settlement. Politics delivered the year’s biggest change that November:
Dwight Eisenhower defeated Adlai Stevenson, promising to “go to Korea” to
end the war and returning Republicans to the White House for the first
time since 1933. The Cold War’s technological edge sharpened that same
month, when the United States tested the first hydrogen bomb at Enewetak
Atoll on November 1, a device hundreds of times more powerful than the
atomic bombs used against Japan in 1945. Consumer prices finished 1952
167.7% above their 1913 level. First-class postage held at
3 cents, and the minimum wage stayed at 75 cents an hour.
Every 1952 amount converts to 1973 at the same ratio, 1.68: $1,000 becomes
$1,675, and $10,000 becomes $16,755.
Amount in 1952
Value in 1973
$1.00
$1.68
$5.00
$8.38
$10.00
$16.75
$20.00
$33.51
$50.00
$83.77
$100
$168
$500
$838
$1,000
$1,675
$5,000
$8,377
$10,000
$16,755
$100,000
$167,547
$1,000,000
$1,675,472
Inflation by spending category, 1952–1973
Between 1952 and 1973, medical care rose the most, up 132.3%, while apparel rose the least, up 48.5%, against 67.5% for all items. The headline number is an average; here is what $100 of 1952
spending costs in 1973, by category:
Category
Avg. yearly inflation
$100 in 1952 →
All items (CPI-U)
2.49%
$168
Medical care
4.10%
$232
Food
2.50%
$168
Transportation
2.27%
$160
Apparel
1.90%
$149
Not shown because the BLS began these indexes after 1952: core (all items less food & energy) (1957–), energy (1957–), housing (1967–), recreation (1993–), education & communication (1993–).
Decade by decade: 1952 to 1973
Prices climbed fastest in the 1970s, averaging 4.60% a year, and slowest in the 1950s (1.39% a year). Each step below chains into the full 1952–1973 change:
Years
Avg. yearly inflation
Price change
$100 from 1952, at end
1952–1960
1.39%
11.7%
$112
1960–1970
2.74%
31.1%
$146
1970–1973
4.60%
14.4%
$168
Year by year: CPI and the value of $100 from 1952
$100 from 1952 had already become $114 by
1962, on its way to $168 in 1973; each row shows the CPI, that
year's inflation rate, and the running value.
Within the span, inflation peaked at 6.2% in 1973, and prices fell 0.4% in 1955, the deepest deflation of the period.
In 1973, prices rose 6.2% and $100 from 1952 had the buying
power of $168; the year's average CPI of 44.4 is the level
behind every 1973 figure on this page.
Consumer prices rose 6.2% in 1973, nearly double 1972’s 3.2%,
as Nixon’s wage and price controls were phased out through the year and
pressure the controls had been holding back broke loose. The bigger shock
arrived that October, when Arab oil-producing states embargoed exports to the
United States and other supporters of Israel in the Yom Kippur War. Crude
oil, which had traded around $3 a barrel, approached $12 by early 1974, and
gas lines became a fixture outside filling stations nationwide. Earlier in
the year, the Paris Peace Accords, signed that January 27, ended direct
American combat in Vietnam and set a 60-day deadline for withdrawing
remaining U.S. troops, even as fighting between North and South Vietnam went
on. Financial markets read the year correctly as a turning point: the Dow
Jones Industrial Average peaked at 1,051.70 on January 11, a level it would
not reach again until 1980, before the oil shock and rising interest rates
dragged it into a two-year bear market. A median household earned $10,512 in
1973, a new home sold for a median $32,500, and gas averaged 38.5 cents a
gallon, still under half of what the embargo’s effects would bring the
following year. Consumer prices stood 348.5% above their
1913 level by year’s end, with the decade’s worst inflation
still ahead.
MLA: “Inflation from 1952 to 1973: $100 is worth $168 today.” InflationCalculator.com, U.S. Bureau of Labor Statistics CPI-U data, https://inflationcalculator.com/inflation/1952-to-1973/
APA: InflationCalculator.com. Inflation from 1952 to 1973. Based on U.S. Bureau of Labor Statistics CPI-U data. Retrieved from https://inflationcalculator.com/inflation/1952-to-1973/