$100 in 1953 is worth $157 in 1972,
because prices increased 56.6% over that period, an average of
2.39% a year.
$100 in 1953 has
the same buying power as
$157
in 1972
Detailed inflation statistics
Cumulative price change
56.6%
Average inflation rate
2.39% per year
Converted amount ($100 base)
$157
Price difference ($100 base)
$56.55
CPI in 1953
26.7
CPI in 1972
41.8
Inflation in 1953
0.75%
Inflation in 1972
3.21%
$100 in 1953 → 1972
$157
$100 in 1972 → 1953
$63.88
What happened to prices between 1953 and 1972
Between 1953 and 1972, the Consumer Price Index went from 26.7 to 41.8.
Cumulatively, prices increased 56.6%, which works out to an average of
2.39% per year. Put differently, a dollar in 1953 bought what
$0.64 buys in 1972: the 1953 dollar
lost 36.1% of its purchasing power over
these 19 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 1972 at the same ratio, 1.57: $1,000 becomes
$1,566, and $10,000 becomes $15,655.
Amount in 1953
Value in 1972
$1.00
$1.57
$5.00
$7.83
$10.00
$15.66
$20.00
$31.31
$50.00
$78.28
$100
$157
$500
$783
$1,000
$1,566
$5,000
$7,828
$10,000
$15,655
$100,000
$156,554
$1,000,000
$1,565,543
Inflation by spending category, 1953–1972
Between 1953 and 1972, medical care rose the most, up 115.6%, while apparel rose the least, up 44.5%, against 56.6% for all items. The headline number is an average; here is what $100 of 1953
spending costs in 1972, by category:
Category
Avg. yearly inflation
$100 in 1953 →
All items (CPI-U)
2.39%
$157
Medical care
4.13%
$216
Transportation
2.18%
$151
Food
2.11%
$149
Apparel
1.96%
$145
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 1972
Prices climbed fastest in the 1970s, averaging 3.79% a year, and slowest in the 1950s (1.48% a year). Each step below chains into the full 1953–1972 change:
Years
Avg. yearly inflation
Price change
$100 from 1953, at end
1953–1960
1.48%
10.9%
$111
1960–1970
2.74%
31.1%
$145
1970–1972
3.79%
7.7%
$157
Year by year: CPI and the value of $100 from 1953
$100 from 1953 had already become $113 by
1962, on its way to $157 in 1972; each row shows the CPI, that
year's inflation rate, and the running value.
Within the span, inflation peaked at 5.7% in 1970, and prices fell 0.4% in 1955, the deepest deflation of the period.
In 1972, prices rose 3.2% and $100 from 1953 had the buying
power of $157; the year's average CPI of 41.8 is the level
behind every 1972 figure on this page.
Consumer prices rose just 3.2% in 1972, the calmest year of the decade and a
sharp break from the previous two years. The relief was largely engineered:
Nixon’s wage and price controls, imposed as a 90-day freeze in August 1971,
had settled into a series of “phases” that capped how much businesses could
raise prices through the election year. Economists would later argue the
controls mostly deferred inflation rather than curing it, storing up pressure
that broke loose once they were lifted. Nixon spent political capital on
foreign policy that year, traveling to Beijing that February in the first
visit by a sitting U.S. president to the People’s Republic of China, a trip
that began normalizing relations Washington had frozen since 1949. Closer to
home, five men were arrested breaking into the Democratic National
Committee’s offices at the Watergate complex that June 17, an event that drew
little attention at the time but would eventually force Nixon from office.
None of it dented his re-election bid: Nixon carried 49 states against
Democrat George McGovern that November, helped by an economy that, on paper,
looked more stable than it had in years. A median household earned $9,697 in
1972, a new home sold for a median $27,600, and gas held near 36 cents a
gallon for a third straight year. Consumer prices stood 322.2% above their
1913 level, a lull that would not survive contact with the
controls’ expiration and the oil shock still to come.
MLA: “Inflation from 1953 to 1972: $100 is worth $157 today.” InflationCalculator.com, U.S. Bureau of Labor Statistics CPI-U data, https://inflationcalculator.com/inflation/1953-to-1972/
APA: InflationCalculator.com. Inflation from 1953 to 1972. Based on U.S. Bureau of Labor Statistics CPI-U data. Retrieved from https://inflationcalculator.com/inflation/1953-to-1972/