$100 in 1960 is worth $106 in 1965,
because prices increased 6.4% over that period, an average of
1.25% a year.
$100 in 1960 has
the same buying power as
$106
in 1965
Detailed inflation statistics
Cumulative price change
6.4%
Average inflation rate
1.25% per year
Converted amount ($100 base)
$106
Price difference ($100 base)
$6.42
CPI in 1960
29.6
CPI in 1965
31.5
Inflation in 1960
1.72%
Inflation in 1965
1.61%
$100 in 1960 → 1965
$106
$100 in 1965 → 1960
$93.97
What happened to prices between 1960 and 1965
Between 1960 and 1965, the Consumer Price Index went from 29.6 to 31.5.
Cumulatively, prices increased 6.4%, which works out to an average of
1.25% per year. Put differently, a dollar in 1960 bought what
$0.94 buys in 1965: the 1960 dollar
lost 6.0% of its purchasing power over
these 5 years.
Consumer prices rose 1.7% in 1960, up from 1959’s 0.7% even
as the economy slipped into recession that April, a downturn that would
prove the shortest since World War II. The year’s defining political
moment came that November, when John F. Kennedy narrowly defeated Richard
Nixon in one of the closest presidential elections in U.S. history,
decided by roughly two-tenths of a percentage point in the popular vote.
Television played a new role in the race: the first-ever televised
presidential debate that September, watched by an estimated 70 million
people, was widely seen as favoring the telegenic Kennedy. Civil rights
protest took a new form that February, when four Black freshmen at North
Carolina A&T State University sat down at a whites-only Woolworth’s lunch
counter in Greensboro and refused to leave; the sit-in tactic spread to
dozens of Southern cities within weeks. Cold War tensions flared that May,
when a Soviet missile downed an American U-2 spy plane deep inside Soviet
airspace. The pilot, Francis Gary Powers, was captured alive, embarrassing
the Eisenhower administration and collapsing a Paris summit called to ease
relations with Moscow. Consumer prices finished 1960 199.0% above their
1913 level. First-class postage held at 4 cents, and the
minimum wage stayed at $1.00 an hour.
Every 1960 amount converts to 1965 at the same ratio, 1.06: $1,000 becomes
$1,064, and $10,000 becomes $10,642.
Amount in 1960
Value in 1965
$1.00
$1.06
$5.00
$5.32
$10.00
$10.64
$20.00
$21.28
$50.00
$53.21
$100
$106
$500
$532
$1,000
$1,064
$5,000
$5,321
$10,000
$10,642
$100,000
$106,419
$1,000,000
$1,064,189
Inflation by spending category, 1960–1965
Between 1960 and 1965, medical care rose the most, up 13.0%, while energy rose the least, up 2.2%, against 6.4% for all items. The headline number is an average; here is what $100 of 1960
spending costs in 1965, by category:
Category
Avg. yearly inflation
$100 in 1960 →
All items (CPI-U)
1.25%
$106
Medical care
2.48%
$113
Food
1.43%
$107
Transportation
1.37%
$107
Core (all items less food & energy)
1.34%
$107
Apparel
0.90%
$105
Energy
0.44%
$102
Not shown because the BLS began these indexes after 1960: housing (1967–), recreation (1993–), education & communication (1993–).
Year by year: CPI and the value of $100 from 1960
$100 from 1960 had already become $102 by
1962, on its way to $106 in 1965; each row shows the CPI, that
year's inflation rate, and the running value.
Within the span, inflation peaked at 1.6% in 1965, and the smallest rise was 1.0% in 1962.
In 1965, prices rose 1.6% and $100 from 1960 had the buying
power of $106; the year's average CPI of 31.5 is the level
behind every 1965 figure on this page.
Consumer prices rose 1.6% in 1965, up from 1964’s 1.3% in a
pickup that economists later mark as the start of the Great
Inflation, a run of accelerating
price increases driven by rising Vietnam War spending layered on top of
new Great Society programs. The war itself escalated on the ground that
March, when about 3,500 Marines came ashore at Da Nang, the first American
combat troops committed to Vietnam; troop levels would climb toward
200,000 by year’s end. Domestic policy expanded just as fast: Medicare and
Medicaid became law that July 30, creating federal health insurance for
older and low-income Americans, and the Voting Rights Act, signed that
August 6, banned literacy tests and other devices used to disenfranchise
Black voters. The civil rights movement’s gains coexisted with urban
unrest that same August, when a highway patrol traffic stop in the Watts
neighborhood of Los Angeles set off six days of rioting that left 34
people dead. Consumer prices finished 1965 218.2% above their
1913 level. First-class postage held at 5 cents, and the
minimum wage stayed at $1.25 an hour.
MLA: “Inflation from 1960 to 1965: $100 is worth $106 today.” InflationCalculator.com, U.S. Bureau of Labor Statistics CPI-U data, https://inflationcalculator.com/inflation/1960-to-1965/
APA: InflationCalculator.com. Inflation from 1960 to 1965. Based on U.S. Bureau of Labor Statistics CPI-U data. Retrieved from https://inflationcalculator.com/inflation/1960-to-1965/