$100 in 1952 is worth $203 in 1975,
because prices increased 103.0% over that period, an average of
3.13% a year.
$100 in 1952 has
the same buying power as
$203
in 1975
Detailed inflation statistics
Cumulative price change
103.0%
Average inflation rate
3.13% per year
Converted amount ($100 base)
$203
Price difference ($100 base)
$103
CPI in 1952
26.5
CPI in 1975
53.8
Inflation in 1952
1.92%
Inflation in 1975
9.13%
$100 in 1952 → 1975
$203
$100 in 1975 → 1952
$49.26
What happened to prices between 1952 and 1975
Between 1952 and 1975, the Consumer Price Index went from 26.5 to 53.8.
Cumulatively, prices increased 103.0%, which works out to an average of
3.13% per year. Put differently, a dollar in 1952 bought what
$0.49 buys in 1975: the 1952 dollar
lost 50.7% of its purchasing power over
these 23 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 1975 at the same ratio, 2.03: $1,000 becomes
$2,030, and $10,000 becomes $20,302.
Amount in 1952
Value in 1975
$1.00
$2.03
$5.00
$10.15
$10.00
$20.30
$20.00
$40.60
$50.00
$102
$100
$203
$500
$1,015
$1,000
$2,030
$5,000
$10,151
$10,000
$20,302
$100,000
$203,019
$1,000,000
$2,030,189
Inflation by spending category, 1952–1975
Between 1952 and 1975, medical care rose the most, up 184.4%, while apparel rose the least, up 66.7%, against 103.0% for all items. The headline number is an average; here is what $100 of 1952
spending costs in 1975, by category:
Category
Avg. yearly inflation
$100 in 1952 →
All items (CPI-U)
3.13%
$203
Medical care
4.65%
$284
Food
3.24%
$208
Transportation
2.94%
$195
Apparel
2.25%
$167
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 1975
Prices climbed fastest in the 1970s, averaging 6.76% a year, and slowest in the 1950s (1.39% a year). Each step below chains into the full 1952–1975 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
1970–1975
6.76%
38.7%
$203
Year by year: CPI and the value of $100 from 1952
$100 from 1952 had already become $115 by
1963, on its way to $203 in 1975; each row shows the CPI, that
year's inflation rate, and the running value.
Within the span, inflation peaked at 11.0% in 1974, and prices fell 0.4% in 1955, the deepest deflation of the period.
In 1975, prices rose 9.1% and $100 from 1952 had the buying
power of $203; the year's average CPI of 53.8 is the level
behind every 1975 figure on this page.
Consumer prices rose 9.1% in 1975, easing slightly from 1974’s
11.0% but still running far above anything the country had experienced before
the decade began. The recession that started in November 1973, the deepest
since the Great Depression, bottomed out that March, yet unemployment kept
climbing through the year and touched 9%, a combination of high inflation and
high joblessness that had no precedent in the postwar data. Vietnam ended
that April 30, when North Vietnamese forces captured Saigon and the last
Americans were evacuated by helicopter from the U.S. embassy roof. Fiscal
strain hit closer to home too: New York City, facing bankruptcy after years
of borrowing to paper over budget gaps, asked Washington for help that
October. President Ford’s initial refusal produced the Daily News headline
“Ford to City: Drop Dead,” though he ultimately signed a federal loan package
that December. Amid the gloom, Bill Gates and Paul Allen founded Microsoft
that April in Albuquerque, New Mexico, to sell a version of the BASIC
programming language for the Altair 8800, one of the first personal
computers sold to hobbyists. A median household earned $11,800 in 1975, a new
home sold for a median $39,300, and first-class postage held at 10 cents,
unchanged since 1974’s increase. Consumer prices stood 443.4%
above their 1913 level, with the decade barely past its
midpoint.
MLA: “Inflation from 1952 to 1975: $100 is worth $203 today.” InflationCalculator.com, U.S. Bureau of Labor Statistics CPI-U data, https://inflationcalculator.com/inflation/1952-to-1975/
APA: InflationCalculator.com. Inflation from 1952 to 1975. Based on U.S. Bureau of Labor Statistics CPI-U data. Retrieved from https://inflationcalculator.com/inflation/1952-to-1975/