$100 in 1953 is worth $244 in 1978,
because prices increased 144.2% over that period, an average of
3.64% a year.
$100 in 1953 has
the same buying power as
$244
in 1978
Detailed inflation statistics
Cumulative price change
144.2%
Average inflation rate
3.64% per year
Converted amount ($100 base)
$244
Price difference ($100 base)
$144
CPI in 1953
26.7
CPI in 1978
65.2
Inflation in 1953
0.75%
Inflation in 1978
7.59%
$100 in 1953 → 1978
$244
$100 in 1978 → 1953
$40.95
What happened to prices between 1953 and 1978
Between 1953 and 1978, the Consumer Price Index went from 26.7 to 65.2.
Cumulatively, prices increased 144.2%, which works out to an average of
3.64% per year. Put differently, a dollar in 1953 bought what
$0.41 buys in 1978: the 1953 dollar
lost 59.0% of its purchasing power over
these 25 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 1978 at the same ratio, 2.44: $1,000 becomes
$2,442, and $10,000 becomes $24,419.
Amount in 1953
Value in 1978
$1.00
$2.44
$5.00
$12.21
$10.00
$24.42
$20.00
$48.84
$50.00
$122
$100
$244
$500
$1,221
$1,000
$2,442
$5,000
$12,210
$10,000
$24,419
$100,000
$244,195
$1,000,000
$2,441,948
Inflation by spending category, 1953–1978
Between 1953 and 1978, medical care rose the most, up 257.2%, while apparel rose the least, up 88.9%, against 144.2% for all items. The headline number is an average; here is what $100 of 1953
spending costs in 1978, by category:
Category
Avg. yearly inflation
$100 in 1953 →
All items (CPI-U)
3.64%
$244
Medical care
5.22%
$357
Food
3.81%
$254
Transportation
3.44%
$233
Apparel
2.58%
$189
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 1978
Prices climbed fastest in the 1970s, averaging 6.70% a year, and slowest in the 1950s (1.48% a year). Each step below chains into the full 1953–1978 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
1970–1978
6.70%
68.0%
$244
Year by year: CPI and the value of $100 from 1953
$100 from 1953 had already become $118 by
1965, on its way to $244 in 1978; 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 1978, prices rose 7.6% and $100 from 1953 had the buying
power of $244; the year's average CPI of 65.2 is the level
behind every 1978 figure on this page.
Consumer prices rose 7.6% in 1978, accelerating for a second straight year as
rising wages, a weakening dollar, and climbing energy costs outpaced the
Federal Reserve’s response. Fed chairman G. William Miller, appointed by
Carter that March, kept interest rates too low to slow the trend, a policy
later cited as one reason inflation kept building toward the following year’s
crisis. California voters responded to their own version of the problem that
June, passing Proposition 13 by nearly two to one to cap property tax rates
after years of rising home values had pushed tax bills up alongside them.
Foreign policy delivered one of the decade’s genuine breakthroughs: President
Carter brought Egyptian President Anwar Sadat and Israeli Prime Minister
Menachem Begin together for thirteen days of negotiations at Camp David that
September, producing a framework for peace between the two countries that was
signed as a treaty the following March. First-class postage rose to 15 cents
that May 29, a rate that would hold longer than any other in the decade. The
year ended in tragedy: cult leader Jim Jones directed the mass murder-suicide
of more than 900 followers at a remote settlement in Guyana that November 18.
A median household earned $15,064 in 1978, a new home sold for a median
$55,700, and gas averaged 63 cents a gallon. Consumer prices stood 558.6%
above their 1913 level, with the decade’s worst inflation
still to come.
MLA: “Inflation from 1953 to 1978: $100 is worth $244 today.” InflationCalculator.com, U.S. Bureau of Labor Statistics CPI-U data, https://inflationcalculator.com/inflation/1953-to-1978/
APA: InflationCalculator.com. Inflation from 1953 to 1978. Based on U.S. Bureau of Labor Statistics CPI-U data. Retrieved from https://inflationcalculator.com/inflation/1953-to-1978/