$100 in 1959 is worth $332 in 1982,
because prices increased 231.6% over that period, an average of
5.35% a year.
$100 in 1959 has
the same buying power as
$332
in 1982
Detailed inflation statistics
Cumulative price change
231.6%
Average inflation rate
5.35% per year
Converted amount ($100 base)
$332
Price difference ($100 base)
$232
CPI in 1959
29.1
CPI in 1982
96.5
Inflation in 1959
0.69%
Inflation in 1982
6.16%
$100 in 1959 → 1982
$332
$100 in 1982 → 1959
$30.16
What happened to prices between 1959 and 1982
Between 1959 and 1982, the Consumer Price Index went from 29.1 to 96.5.
Cumulatively, prices increased 231.6%, which works out to an average of
5.35% per year. Put differently, a dollar in 1959 bought what
$0.30 buys in 1982: the 1959 dollar
lost 69.8% of its purchasing power over
these 23 years.
Consumer prices rose 0.7% in 1959, down sharply from 1958’s
2.8% as the economy recovered briskly from the year before’s recession,
with output and employment both rebounding through the year. The map of
the country changed that year for the first time since 1912: Alaska
joined the union January 3, and Hawaii followed August 21, completing the
50-state United States. Ninety miles from Florida, Cuba changed hands
that January, when Fidel Castro’s guerrilla forces overthrew President
Fulgencio Batista, who fled the country on the 1st; Castro entered Havana
on the 8th, beginning a Communist government that would define Cold War
tensions in the hemisphere for decades. Labor and management fought their
longest battle of the postwar era that summer: the United Steelworkers
walked out July 15 in a dispute over work rules, the longest strike in the
industry’s history, before a federal court granted the Eisenhower
administration a Taft-Hartley back-to-work order that November. Consumer
prices finished the decade 193.9% above their 1913 level,
up 20.7% from where they stood in 1950. First-class
postage held at 4 cents, and the minimum wage stayed at $1.00 an hour.
Every 1959 amount converts to 1982 at the same ratio, 3.32: $1,000 becomes
$3,316, and $10,000 becomes $33,162.
Amount in 1959
Value in 1982
$1.00
$3.32
$5.00
$16.58
$10.00
$33.16
$20.00
$66.32
$50.00
$166
$100
$332
$500
$1,658
$1,000
$3,316
$5,000
$16,581
$10,000
$33,162
$100,000
$331,615
$1,000,000
$3,316,151
Inflation by spending category, 1959–1982
Between 1959 and 1982, energy rose the most, up 353.0%, while apparel rose the least, up 117.3%, against 231.6% for all items. The headline number is an average; here is what $100 of 1959
spending costs in 1982, by category:
Category
Avg. yearly inflation
$100 in 1959 →
All items (CPI-U)
5.35%
$332
Energy
6.79%
$453
Medical care
6.55%
$430
Food
5.30%
$328
Transportation
5.27%
$326
Core (all items less food & energy)
5.15%
$317
Apparel
3.43%
$217
Not shown because the BLS began these indexes after 1959: housing (1967–), recreation (1993–), education & communication (1993–).
Decade by decade: 1959 to 1982
Prices climbed fastest in the 1980s, averaging 8.22% a year, and slowest in the 1950s (1.72% a year). Each step below chains into the full 1959–1982 change:
Years
Avg. yearly inflation
Price change
$100 from 1959, at end
1959–1960
1.72%
1.7%
$102
1960–1970
2.74%
31.1%
$133
1970–1980
7.82%
112.4%
$283
1980–1982
8.22%
17.1%
$332
Year by year: CPI and the value of $100 from 1959
$100 from 1959 had already become $133 by
1970, on its way to $332 in 1982; 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 1.0% in 1962.
In 1982, prices rose 6.2% and $100 from 1959 had the buying
power of $332; the year's average CPI of 96.5 is the level
behind every 1982 figure on this page.
1982 was the hard bottom of the disinflation Paul Volcker had set in motion.
Consumer prices rose just 6.2% for the year, roughly half of 1981’s rate and a
fraction of the 13.5% peak from two years earlier. The price fell because
demand had been crushed: the recession that began in July 1981 did not
officially end until November 1982, and unemployment kept climbing even as
the economy technically began to recover, reaching 10.8% in November and
December, the highest rate since the Great Depression. Manufacturing and
construction, especially the auto and housing industries starved of credit by
double-digit interest rates, bore the worst of it. Abroad, Mexico’s August
announcement that it could not service its foreign debt opened a Latin
American debt crisis that spread across the region and forced the Federal
Reserve and IMF into emergency lending. The stress on the financial system
pushed Volcker to start easing interest rates that October, stepping back
from the strict money-supply targets he had followed since 1979. Markets read
the shift correctly: the Dow Jones Industrial Average bottomed at 776.92 in
mid-August, and the rally that followed became the opening leg of the 1980s
bull market. By year’s end, the trade-off Volcker had bet on was becoming
visible: much lower inflation, at the cost of the worst unemployment in 40
years.
MLA: “Inflation from 1959 to 1982: $100 is worth $332 today.” InflationCalculator.com, U.S. Bureau of Labor Statistics CPI-U data, https://inflationcalculator.com/inflation/1959-to-1982/
APA: InflationCalculator.com. Inflation from 1959 to 1982. Based on U.S. Bureau of Labor Statistics CPI-U data. Retrieved from https://inflationcalculator.com/inflation/1959-to-1982/