$100 in 1953 is worth $118 in 1965,
because prices increased 18.0% over that period, an average of
1.39% a year.
$100 in 1953 has
the same buying power as
$118
in 1965
Detailed inflation statistics
Cumulative price change
18.0%
Average inflation rate
1.39% per year
Converted amount ($100 base)
$118
Price difference ($100 base)
$17.98
CPI in 1953
26.7
CPI in 1965
31.5
Inflation in 1953
0.75%
Inflation in 1965
1.61%
$100 in 1953 → 1965
$118
$100 in 1965 → 1953
$84.76
What happened to prices between 1953 and 1965
Between 1953 and 1965, the Consumer Price Index went from 26.7 to 31.5.
Cumulatively, prices increased 18.0%, which works out to an average of
1.39% per year. Put differently, a dollar in 1953 bought what
$0.85 buys in 1965: the 1953 dollar
lost 15.2% of its purchasing power over
these 12 years.
Consumer prices rose 0.8% in 1953, down from 1952’s 1.9% as
fighting in Korea wound toward a truce and three years of wartime buying
pressure finally eased. The year’s biggest shock came from Moscow: Soviet
leader Joseph Stalin died March 5 after nearly three decades in power, the
first change of Soviet leadership since the 1920s, opening a period of
uncertainty over how his successors would deal with the West. Washington
used the calmer backdrop to unwind its own wartime machinery. Authority
for the price and wage controls imposed in 1951 lapsed that spring, as the
Eisenhower administration, which favored free markets over controls, wound
down the Office of Price Stabilization. The war itself ended, on paper,
that July: negotiators signed an armistice July 27 at Panmunjom, halting
the fighting roughly along the original border near the 38th parallel. No
formal peace treaty ever followed, and North and South Korea remain
technically at war. Consumer prices finished 1953 169.7% above their
1913 level. First-class postage held at 3 cents, and the
minimum wage stayed at 75 cents an hour.
Every 1953 amount converts to 1965 at the same ratio, 1.18: $1,000 becomes
$1,180, and $10,000 becomes $11,798.
Amount in 1953
Value in 1965
$1.00
$1.18
$5.00
$5.90
$10.00
$11.80
$20.00
$23.60
$50.00
$58.99
$100
$118
$500
$590
$1,000
$1,180
$5,000
$5,899
$10,000
$11,798
$100,000
$117,978
$1,000,000
$1,179,775
Inflation by spending category, 1953–1965
Between 1953 and 1965, medical care rose the most, up 45.7%, while apparel rose the least, up 10.9%, against 18.0% for all items. The headline number is an average; here is what $100 of 1953
spending costs in 1965, by category:
Category
Avg. yearly inflation
$100 in 1953 →
All items (CPI-U)
1.39%
$118
Medical care
3.18%
$146
Transportation
1.56%
$120
Food
1.08%
$114
Apparel
0.87%
$111
Not shown because the BLS began these indexes after 1953: core (all items less food & energy) (1957–), energy (1957–), housing (1967–), recreation (1993–), education & communication (1993–).
Decade by decade: 1953 to 1965
Prices climbed fastest in the 1950s, averaging 1.48% a year, and slowest in the 1960s (1.25% a year). Each step below chains into the full 1953–1965 change:
Years
Avg. yearly inflation
Price change
$100 from 1953, at end
1953–1960
1.48%
10.9%
$111
1960–1965
1.25%
6.4%
$118
Year by year: CPI and the value of $100 from 1953
$100 from 1953 had already become $109 by
1959, on its way to $118 in 1965; 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 1965, prices rose 1.6% and $100 from 1953 had the buying
power of $118; the year's average CPI of 31.5 is the level
behind every 1965 figure on this page.
Consumer prices rose 1.6% in 1965, up from 1964’s 1.3% in a
pickup that economists later mark as the start of the Great
Inflation, a run of accelerating
price increases driven by rising Vietnam War spending layered on top of
new Great Society programs. The war itself escalated on the ground that
March, when about 3,500 Marines came ashore at Da Nang, the first American
combat troops committed to Vietnam; troop levels would climb toward
200,000 by year’s end. Domestic policy expanded just as fast: Medicare and
Medicaid became law that July 30, creating federal health insurance for
older and low-income Americans, and the Voting Rights Act, signed that
August 6, banned literacy tests and other devices used to disenfranchise
Black voters. The civil rights movement’s gains coexisted with urban
unrest that same August, when a highway patrol traffic stop in the Watts
neighborhood of Los Angeles set off six days of rioting that left 34
people dead. Consumer prices finished 1965 218.2% above their
1913 level. First-class postage held at 5 cents, and the
minimum wage stayed at $1.25 an hour.
MLA: “Inflation from 1953 to 1965: $100 is worth $118 today.” InflationCalculator.com, U.S. Bureau of Labor Statistics CPI-U data, https://inflationcalculator.com/inflation/1953-to-1965/
APA: InflationCalculator.com. Inflation from 1953 to 1965. Based on U.S. Bureau of Labor Statistics CPI-U data. Retrieved from https://inflationcalculator.com/inflation/1953-to-1965/