$100 in 1955 is worth $307 in 1980,
because prices increased 207.5% over that period, an average of
4.60% a year.
$100 in 1955 has
the same buying power as
$307
in 1980
Detailed inflation statistics
Cumulative price change
207.5%
Average inflation rate
4.60% per year
Converted amount ($100 base)
$307
Price difference ($100 base)
$207
CPI in 1955
26.8
CPI in 1980
82.4
Inflation in 1955
-0.37%
Inflation in 1980
13.50%
$100 in 1955 → 1980
$307
$100 in 1980 → 1955
$32.52
What happened to prices between 1955 and 1980
Between 1955 and 1980, the Consumer Price Index went from 26.8 to 82.4.
Cumulatively, prices increased 207.5%, which works out to an average of
4.60% per year. Put differently, a dollar in 1955 bought what
$0.33 buys in 1980: the 1955 dollar
lost 67.5% of its purchasing power over
these 25 years.
Consumer prices fell 0.4% in 1955, the first annual decline since 1949,
as a strong rebound from the 1953-54 recession delivered growth without
much price pressure; automakers and appliance makers competed hard on
price for a booming consumer market. Organized labor consolidated that
December, when the American Federation of Labor and the Congress of
Industrial Organizations merged on the 5th under President George Meany,
uniting roughly 15 million workers in the AFL-CIO after two decades as
rival federations. That same day, a different kind of organizing began in
Montgomery, Alabama: four days after Rosa Parks was arrested for refusing
to give up her bus seat to a white passenger, the city’s Black community
began a boycott of its buses that would last more than a year and help
launch the civil rights movement’s mass phase. Markets got a scare that
September: news of Eisenhower’s heart attack on the 24th sent the Dow
Jones Industrial Average to its steepest one-day drop since the 1929
crash when trading resumed that Monday, before stocks recovered as the
president’s health improved. Consumer prices finished 1955 170.7% above
their 1913 level, essentially unchanged from where they
stood a year earlier. First-class postage held at 3 cents, and the
minimum wage stayed at 75 cents an hour.
Every 1955 amount converts to 1980 at the same ratio, 3.07: $1,000 becomes
$3,075, and $10,000 becomes $30,746.
Amount in 1955
Value in 1980
$1.00
$3.07
$5.00
$15.37
$10.00
$30.75
$20.00
$61.49
$50.00
$154
$100
$307
$500
$1,537
$1,000
$3,075
$5,000
$15,373
$10,000
$30,746
$100,000
$307,463
$1,000,000
$3,074,627
Inflation by spending category, 1955–1980
Between 1955 and 1980, medical care rose the most, up 311.5%, while apparel rose the least, up 111.9%, against 207.5% for all items. The headline number is an average; here is what $100 of 1955
spending costs in 1980, by category:
Category
Avg. yearly inflation
$100 in 1955 →
All items (CPI-U)
4.60%
$307
Medical care
5.82%
$412
Transportation
4.79%
$322
Food
4.66%
$312
Apparel
3.05%
$212
Not shown because the BLS began these indexes after 1955: core (all items less food & energy) (1957–), energy (1957–), housing (1967–), recreation (1993–), education & communication (1993–).
Decade by decade: 1955 to 1980
Prices climbed fastest in the 1970s, averaging 7.82% a year, and slowest in the 1950s (2.01% a year). Each step below chains into the full 1955–1980 change:
Years
Avg. yearly inflation
Price change
$100 from 1955, at end
1955–1960
2.01%
10.4%
$110
1960–1970
2.74%
31.1%
$145
1970–1980
7.82%
112.4%
$307
Year by year: CPI and the value of $100 from 1955
$100 from 1955 had already become $125 by
1967, on its way to $307 in 1980; 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 the smallest rise was 0.7% in 1959.
In 1980, prices rose 13.5% and $100 from 1955 had the buying
power of $307; the year's average CPI of 82.4 is the level
behind every 1980 figure on this page.
1980 sat at the very peak of the Great Inflation. Prices rose 13.5% in that
single year, mortgage rates were climbing toward 16%, and the Federal Reserve
under Paul Volcker was administering the painful interest-rate medicine that
would finally break the inflationary spiral, at the cost of the deep 1981–82
recession. No single year looms larger in how Americans think about inflation.
MLA: “Inflation from 1955 to 1980: $100 is worth $307 today.” InflationCalculator.com, U.S. Bureau of Labor Statistics CPI-U data, https://inflationcalculator.com/inflation/1955-to-1980/
APA: InflationCalculator.com. Inflation from 1955 to 1980. Based on U.S. Bureau of Labor Statistics CPI-U data. Retrieved from https://inflationcalculator.com/inflation/1955-to-1980/