$100 in 1958 is worth $116 in 1967,
because prices increased 15.6% over that period, an average of
1.62% a year.
$100 in 1958 has
the same buying power as
$116
in 1967
Detailed inflation statistics
Cumulative price change
15.6%
Average inflation rate
1.62% per year
Converted amount ($100 base)
$116
Price difference ($100 base)
$15.57
CPI in 1958
28.9
CPI in 1967
33.4
Inflation in 1958
2.85%
Inflation in 1967
3.09%
$100 in 1958 → 1967
$116
$100 in 1967 → 1958
$86.53
What happened to prices between 1958 and 1967
Between 1958 and 1967, the Consumer Price Index went from 28.9 to 33.4.
Cumulatively, prices increased 15.6%, which works out to an average of
1.62% per year. Put differently, a dollar in 1958 bought what
$0.87 buys in 1967: the 1958 dollar
lost 13.5% of its purchasing power over
these 9 years.
Consumer prices rose 2.8% in 1958, down only slightly from
1957’s 3.3% even as the country sank into the sharpest
postwar recession to that point, an early sign that inflation and a
shrinking economy could coexist rather than trade off against each other.
The National Bureau of Economic Research dates the downturn’s trough to
that April, with unemployment peaking near 7.5% that summer, the worst
reading since the 1930s. The Post Office raised first-class postage to 4
cents that August 1, up from 3 cents, the rate’s first change since 1932.
Washington answered the Soviet Union’s technological lead that summer
too: Eisenhower signed the National Aeronautics and Space Act on July 29,
establishing NASA, which opened for business that October 1 to compete
with the Soviet space program after the shock of Sputnik the year before.
Consumer prices finished 1958 191.9% above their 1913
level. The minimum wage held at $1.00 an hour, and first-class postage
rose to 4 cents that August, the first increase since 1932.
Every 1958 amount converts to 1967 at the same ratio, 1.16: $1,000 becomes
$1,156, and $10,000 becomes $11,557.
Amount in 1958
Value in 1967
$1.00
$1.16
$5.00
$5.78
$10.00
$11.56
$20.00
$23.11
$50.00
$57.79
$100
$116
$500
$578
$1,000
$1,156
$5,000
$5,779
$10,000
$11,557
$100,000
$115,571
$1,000,000
$1,155,709
Inflation by spending category, 1958–1967
Between 1958 and 1967, medical care rose the most, up 36.9%, while energy rose the least, up 10.7%, against 15.6% for all items. The headline number is an average; here is what $100 of 1958
spending costs in 1967, by category:
Category
Avg. yearly inflation
$100 in 1958 →
All items (CPI-U)
1.62%
$116
Medical care
3.55%
$137
Core (all items less food & energy)
1.78%
$117
Transportation
1.70%
$116
Apparel
1.50%
$114
Food
1.36%
$113
Energy
1.14%
$111
Not shown because the BLS began these indexes after 1958: housing (1967–), recreation (1993–), education & communication (1993–).
Decade by decade: 1958 to 1967
Prices climbed fastest in the 1960s, averaging 1.74% a year, and slowest in the 1950s (1.20% a year). Each step below chains into the full 1958–1967 change:
Years
Avg. yearly inflation
Price change
$100 from 1958, at end
1958–1960
1.20%
2.4%
$102
1960–1967
1.74%
12.8%
$116
Year by year: CPI and the value of $100 from 1958
$100 from 1958 had already become $104 by
1962, on its way to $116 in 1967; each row shows the CPI, that
year's inflation rate, and the running value.
Within the span, inflation peaked at 3.1% in 1967, and the smallest rise was 0.7% in 1959.
In 1967, prices rose 3.1% and $100 from 1958 had the buying
power of $116; the year's average CPI of 33.4 is the level
behind every 1967 figure on this page.
Consumer prices rose 3.1% in 1967, up from 1966’s 2.9% as
Vietnam War spending kept climbing alongside expanding Great Society
programs, a combination of rising military and domestic outlays that
economists later blamed for entrenching inflation through the rest of the
decade. The minimum wage rose that February 1, to $1.40 an hour, the
first step of a phased increase Congress had set the year before. Urban
unrest reached a peak that July, when days of rioting left 26 dead in
Newark and 43 dead in Detroit, the deadliest of that summer’s roughly 160
disturbances; Johnson responded by forming the Kerner Commission to study
the causes of the unrest. The Supreme Court gained its first Black
justice that year too: the Senate confirmed Thurgood Marshall on August
30, and he was sworn in that October after serving as U.S. Solicitor
General and, before that, as the lead attorney in Brown v. Board of
Education. Consumer prices finished 1967 237.4% above their
1913 level. First-class postage held at 5 cents.
MLA: “Inflation from 1958 to 1967: $100 is worth $116 today.” InflationCalculator.com, U.S. Bureau of Labor Statistics CPI-U data, https://inflationcalculator.com/inflation/1958-to-1967/
APA: InflationCalculator.com. Inflation from 1958 to 1967. Based on U.S. Bureau of Labor Statistics CPI-U data. Retrieved from https://inflationcalculator.com/inflation/1958-to-1967/