$100 in 1955 is worth $814 in 2010,
because prices increased 713.6% over that period, an average of
3.89% a year.
$100 in 1955 has
the same buying power as
$814
in 2010
Detailed inflation statistics
Cumulative price change
713.6%
Average inflation rate
3.89% per year
Converted amount ($100 base)
$814
Price difference ($100 base)
$714
CPI in 1955
26.8
CPI in 2010
218.056
Inflation in 1955
-0.37%
Inflation in 2010
1.64%
$100 in 1955 → 2010
$814
$100 in 2010 → 1955
$12.29
What happened to prices between 1955 and 2010
Between 1955 and 2010, the Consumer Price Index went from 26.8 to 218.056.
Cumulatively, prices increased 713.6%, which works out to an average of
3.89% per year. Put differently, a dollar in 1955 bought what
$0.12 buys in 2010: the 1955 dollar
lost 87.7% of its purchasing power over
these 55 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 2010 at the same ratio, 8.14: $1,000 becomes
$8,136, and $10,000 becomes $81,364.
Amount in 1955
Value in 2010
$1.00
$8.14
$5.00
$40.68
$10.00
$81.36
$20.00
$163
$50.00
$407
$100
$814
$500
$4,068
$1,000
$8,136
$5,000
$40,682
$10,000
$81,364
$100,000
$813,642
$1,000,000
$8,136,418
Inflation by spending category, 1955–2010
Between 1955 and 2010, medical care rose the most, up 2034.3%, while apparel rose the least, up 178.6%, against 713.6% for all items. The headline number is an average; here is what $100 of 1955
spending costs in 2010, by category:
Category
Avg. yearly inflation
$100 in 1955 →
All items (CPI-U)
3.89%
$814
Medical care
5.72%
$2,134
Food
3.83%
$790
Transportation
3.73%
$750
Apparel
1.88%
$279
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 2010
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 1955–2010 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
1980–1990
4.72%
58.6%
$488
1990–2000
2.80%
31.8%
$643
2000–2010
2.39%
26.6%
$814
Year by year: CPI and the value of $100 from 1955
$100 from 1955 had already become $372 by
1983, on its way to $814 in 2010; 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 2009, the deepest deflation of the period.
Long periods are sampled every 2 years; the calculator above covers any pair of years.
The destination year: 2010
In 2010, prices rose 1.6% and $100 from 1955 had the buying
power of $814; the year's average CPI of 218.056 is the level
behind every 2010 figure on this page.
2010 was a year of recovery without much price pressure. The CPI rose 1.6%, a
return to growth after 2009’s deflation, with gasoline averaging $2.78 a
gallon as energy prices climbed back from their recession lows. Housing costs
barely moved: millions of foreclosed and vacant homes kept rents soft, and the
median new home sold for about $221,800. The federal minimum wage stayed at
$7.25, the level set in July 2009, and a first-class stamp cost 44 cents.
The Federal Reserve was more worried about too little inflation than too
much. Its policy rate sat at 0–0.25%, and in November it announced a further
$600 billion of Treasury purchases to hold down long-term borrowing costs.
Congress passed the Dodd-Frank Act in July to tighten financial regulation,
while a 110 billion euro rescue of Greece in May showed that the crisis had
moved from American mortgages to European government debt. For anyone
comparing dollars across the decade, 2010 is a useful baseline: prices were
still close to their 2008 levels, and the years ahead brought a slow, steady
climb.
MLA: “Inflation from 1955 to 2010: $100 is worth $814 today.” InflationCalculator.com, U.S. Bureau of Labor Statistics CPI-U data, https://inflationcalculator.com/inflation/1955-to-2010/
APA: InflationCalculator.com. Inflation from 1955 to 2010. Based on U.S. Bureau of Labor Statistics CPI-U data. Retrieved from https://inflationcalculator.com/inflation/1955-to-2010/