$100 in 1952 is worth $376 in 1983,
because prices increased 275.8% over that period, an average of
4.36% a year.
$100 in 1952 has
the same buying power as
$376
in 1983
Detailed inflation statistics
Cumulative price change
275.8%
Average inflation rate
4.36% per year
Converted amount ($100 base)
$376
Price difference ($100 base)
$276
CPI in 1952
26.5
CPI in 1983
99.6
Inflation in 1952
1.92%
Inflation in 1983
3.21%
$100 in 1952 → 1983
$376
$100 in 1983 → 1952
$26.61
What happened to prices between 1952 and 1983
Between 1952 and 1983, the Consumer Price Index went from 26.5 to 99.6.
Cumulatively, prices increased 275.8%, which works out to an average of
4.36% per year. Put differently, a dollar in 1952 bought what
$0.27 buys in 1983: the 1952 dollar
lost 73.4% of its purchasing power over
these 31 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 1983 at the same ratio, 3.76: $1,000 becomes
$3,758, and $10,000 becomes $37,585.
Amount in 1952
Value in 1983
$1.00
$3.76
$5.00
$18.79
$10.00
$37.58
$20.00
$75.17
$50.00
$188
$100
$376
$500
$1,879
$1,000
$3,758
$5,000
$18,792
$10,000
$37,585
$100,000
$375,849
$1,000,000
$3,758,491
Inflation by spending category, 1952–1983
Between 1952 and 1983, medical care rose the most, up 502.4%, while apparel rose the least, up 130.3%, against 275.8% for all items. The headline number is an average; here is what $100 of 1952
spending costs in 1983, by category:
Category
Avg. yearly inflation
$100 in 1952 →
All items (CPI-U)
4.36%
$376
Medical care
5.96%
$602
Transportation
4.46%
$386
Food
4.09%
$346
Apparel
2.73%
$230
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 1983
Prices climbed fastest in the 1970s, averaging 7.82% a year, and slowest in the 1950s (1.39% a year). Each step below chains into the full 1952–1983 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
1970–1980
7.82%
112.4%
$311
1980–1983
6.52%
20.9%
$376
Year by year: CPI and the value of $100 from 1952
$100 from 1952 had already become $131 by
1968, on its way to $376 in 1983; 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: 1983
In 1983, prices rose 3.2% and $100 from 1952 had the buying
power of $376; the year's average CPI of 99.6 is the level
behind every 1983 figure on this page.
1983 confirmed that the Volcker disinflation was not a one-year fluke.
Consumer prices rose 3.2% for the year, nearly identical to 1982’s pace and a
fraction of the double-digit rates of 1980 and 1981. With inflation tamed and
interest rates coming down, the economy roared back from the 1981-82
recession: real GDP grew 4.6%, the strongest calendar-year growth since the
1950s, and unemployment fell from its 10.8% peak to 8.3% by December. Housing
and auto sales, both starved of credit during the recession, led the
rebound. In April, Congress and President Reagan enacted the Social Security
Amendments of 1983, a bipartisan rescue of a system projected to run out of
money within months. The law gradually raised the full retirement age from
65 to 67, began taxing benefits for higher-income retirees, and delayed that
year’s cost-of-living adjustment by six months. For a program whose benefits
had been indexed to the CPI since 1975, the amendments were the first major
sign that inflation-proofing Social Security carried a cost Congress could
not simply legislate away. By year’s end, gas averaged $1.16 a gallon and
mailing a letter still cost 20 cents, prices that had barely moved since
1981, a sharp break from the constant increases of the previous decade.
MLA: “Inflation from 1952 to 1983: $100 is worth $376 today.” InflationCalculator.com, U.S. Bureau of Labor Statistics CPI-U data, https://inflationcalculator.com/inflation/1952-to-1983/
APA: InflationCalculator.com. Inflation from 1952 to 1983. Based on U.S. Bureau of Labor Statistics CPI-U data. Retrieved from https://inflationcalculator.com/inflation/1952-to-1983/