$100 in 1956 is worth $940 in 2019,
because prices increased 839.9% over that period, an average of
3.62% a year.
$100 in 1956 has
the same buying power as
$940
in 2019
Detailed inflation statistics
Cumulative price change
839.9%
Average inflation rate
3.62% per year
Converted amount ($100 base)
$940
Price difference ($100 base)
$840
CPI in 1956
27.2
CPI in 2019
255.657
Inflation in 1956
1.49%
Inflation in 2019
1.81%
$100 in 1956 → 2019
$940
$100 in 2019 → 1956
$10.64
What happened to prices between 1956 and 2019
Between 1956 and 2019, the Consumer Price Index went from 27.2 to 255.657.
Cumulatively, prices increased 839.9%, which works out to an average of
3.62% per year. Put differently, a dollar in 1956 bought what
$0.11 buys in 2019: the 1956 dollar
lost 89.4% of its purchasing power over
these 63 years.
Consumer prices rose 1.5% in 1956, a return to mild inflation after they had
fallen 0.4% in 1955, the only annual decline of the decade. The two years sat
in the calmest stretch of the postwar index, a lull between the Korean War
price surge earlier in the 1950s and the acceleration that would return in
the 1970s. Congress had already raised the wage floor into that calm: the
Fair Labor Standards Amendments of 1955, signed the previous August, took
effect March 1 and lifted the federal minimum wage from 75 cents to $1 an
hour, the first increase since 1950. Eisenhower signed a longer-lasting
commitment on June 29, the Federal-Aid Highway Act, funding 41,000 miles of
controlled-access highway at 90% federal cost to build the Interstate
System, the largest public-works program the country had undertaken. He won
a second term that November, carrying 41 states and about 57% of the
popular vote in a rematch against Adlai Stevenson. Abroad, the Suez Crisis
broke the calm on the supply side: Egypt nationalized the canal on July 26,
and after Israel invaded the Sinai on October 29 with British and French
forces following, the canal’s closure and damaged pipelines squeezed oil
shipments to Western Europe for months. Consumer prices stood 174.7% above
their 1913 level by 1956, up 94% since 1940
alone, even after a decade that had barely moved the index. First-class
postage held at 3 cents, unchanged since 1932.
Every 1956 amount converts to 2019 at the same ratio, 9.40: $1,000 becomes
$9,399, and $10,000 becomes $93,992.
Amount in 1956
Value in 2019
$1.00
$9.40
$5.00
$47.00
$10.00
$93.99
$20.00
$188
$50.00
$470
$100
$940
$500
$4,700
$1,000
$9,399
$5,000
$46,996
$10,000
$93,992
$100,000
$939,915
$1,000,000
$9,399,154
Inflation by spending category, 1956–2019
Between 1956 and 2019, medical care rose the most, up 2537.1%, while apparel rose the least, up 183.9%, against 839.9% for all items. The headline number is an average; here is what $100 of 1956
spending costs in 2019, by category:
Category
Avg. yearly inflation
$100 in 1956 →
All items (CPI-U)
3.62%
$940
Medical care
5.33%
$2,637
Food
3.59%
$923
Transportation
3.36%
$802
Apparel
1.67%
$284
Not shown because the BLS began these indexes after 1956: core (all items less food & energy) (1957–), energy (1957–), housing (1967–), recreation (1993–), education & communication (1993–).
Decade by decade: 1956 to 2019
Prices climbed fastest in the 1970s, averaging 7.82% a year, and slowest in the 2010s (1.78% a year). Each step below chains into the full 1956–2019 change:
Years
Avg. yearly inflation
Price change
$100 from 1956, at end
1956–1960
2.14%
8.8%
$109
1960–1970
2.74%
31.1%
$143
1970–1980
7.82%
112.4%
$303
1980–1990
4.72%
58.6%
$481
1990–2000
2.80%
31.8%
$633
2000–2010
2.39%
26.6%
$802
2010–2019
1.78%
17.2%
$940
Year by year: CPI and the value of $100 from 1956
$100 from 1956 had already become $403 by
1986, on its way to $940 in 2019; 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 5 years; the calculator above covers any pair of years.
The destination year: 2019
In 2019, prices rose 1.8% and $100 from 1956 had the buying
power of $940; the year's average CPI of 255.657 is the level
behind every 2019 figure on this page.
2019 was the last ordinary year before COVID-19. Consumer prices rose 1.8%,
slightly under the Federal Reserve’s 2% target, with gasoline averaging
$2.60 a gallon. Median household income jumped to $68,703, the highest on
record up to that point, and the median new home sold for about $328,000. A
first-class stamp rose to 55 cents.
The Fed reversed course. After four increases in 2018, it cut rates three
times, to 1.50–1.75%, citing slower global growth, trade tensions, and low
inflation. In July the expansion that began in June 2009 became the longest in
U.S. records, and in August the yield curve briefly inverted, a signal
investors read as a recession warning.
For workers at the bottom of the pay scale, 2019 marked a milestone of a
different kind. The federal minimum wage stayed at $7.25 and reached its tenth
year without an increase, the longest gap since the wage was first set. Because
prices had climbed about 19% since it was last raised in 2009, its buying power
was lower than at any point in that span.
MLA: “Inflation from 1956 to 2019: $100 is worth $940 today.” InflationCalculator.com, U.S. Bureau of Labor Statistics CPI-U data, https://inflationcalculator.com/inflation/1956-to-2019/
APA: InflationCalculator.com. Inflation from 1956 to 2019. Based on U.S. Bureau of Labor Statistics CPI-U data. Retrieved from https://inflationcalculator.com/inflation/1956-to-2019/