$100 in 1960 is worth $245 in 1979,
because prices increased 145.3% over that period, an average of
4.84% a year.
$100 in 1960 has
the same buying power as
$245
in 1979
Detailed inflation statistics
Cumulative price change
145.3%
Average inflation rate
4.84% per year
Converted amount ($100 base)
$245
Price difference ($100 base)
$145
CPI in 1960
29.6
CPI in 1979
72.6
Inflation in 1960
1.72%
Inflation in 1979
11.35%
$100 in 1960 → 1979
$245
$100 in 1979 → 1960
$40.77
What happened to prices between 1960 and 1979
Between 1960 and 1979, the Consumer Price Index went from 29.6 to 72.6.
Cumulatively, prices increased 145.3%, which works out to an average of
4.84% per year. Put differently, a dollar in 1960 bought what
$0.41 buys in 1979: the 1960 dollar
lost 59.2% of its purchasing power over
these 19 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 1979 at the same ratio, 2.45: $1,000 becomes
$2,453, and $10,000 becomes $24,527.
Amount in 1960
Value in 1979
$1.00
$2.45
$5.00
$12.26
$10.00
$24.53
$20.00
$49.05
$50.00
$123
$100
$245
$500
$1,226
$1,000
$2,453
$5,000
$12,264
$10,000
$24,527
$100,000
$245,270
$1,000,000
$2,452,703
Inflation by spending category, 1960–1979
Between 1960 and 1979, medical care rose the most, up 202.7%, while apparel rose the least, up 85.8%, against 145.3% for all items. The headline number is an average; here is what $100 of 1960
spending costs in 1979, by category:
Category
Avg. yearly inflation
$100 in 1960 →
All items (CPI-U)
4.84%
$245
Medical care
6.00%
$303
Energy
5.83%
$293
Food
5.29%
$266
Transportation
4.64%
$237
Core (all items less food & energy)
4.60%
$235
Apparel
3.31%
$186
Not shown because the BLS began these indexes after 1960: housing (1967–), recreation (1993–), education & communication (1993–).
Decade by decade: 1960 to 1979
Prices climbed fastest in the 1970s, averaging 7.21% a year, and slowest in the 1960s (2.74% a year). Each step below chains into the full 1960–1979 change:
Years
Avg. yearly inflation
Price change
$100 from 1960, at end
1960–1970
2.74%
31.1%
$131
1970–1979
7.21%
87.1%
$245
Year by year: CPI and the value of $100 from 1960
$100 from 1960 had already become $124 by
1969, on its way to $245 in 1979; each row shows the CPI, that
year's inflation rate, and the running value.
Within the span, inflation peaked at 11.3% in 1979, and the smallest rise was 1.0% in 1962.
In 1979, prices rose 11.3% and $100 from 1960 had the buying
power of $245; the year's average CPI of 72.6 is the level
behind every 1979 figure on this page.
Consumer prices rose 11.3% in 1979, the fastest pace since 1947 and the
decade’s second bout of double-digit inflation after 1974’s
11.0%. The trigger was familiar: the Iranian Revolution that January halted
Iran’s oil exports, and panic buying amplified the shortage, sending crude
prices sharply higher over the year and motorists back into gas lines, with
some states reviving the odd-even rationing last seen in 1974. Paul Volcker,
appointed Federal Reserve chairman that August, responded with a strategy
shift announced that October: the Fed would target the money supply directly
and let interest rates rise as high as necessary to break inflation, whatever
the short-term cost. That cost would arrive as a deep recession in 1981-82,
but by year’s end 1979 had already delivered enough turmoil on its own. A
reactor at the Three Mile Island plant near Harrisburg, Pennsylvania,
suffered a partial core meltdown that March 28, the worst commercial nuclear
accident in U.S. history, and on November 4, militants in Tehran stormed the
U.S. embassy and took 52 Americans hostage, beginning a 444-day crisis that
consumed the rest of Carter’s presidency. A median household earned $16,461
in 1979, a new home sold for a median $62,900, and gas jumped to 86 cents a
gallon. Consumer prices finished the decade 97.8% above where they stood in
1969, very nearly doubling in ten years, and stood 633.3%
above their 1913 level. The 1970s had opened with inflation
cooling from the 1969 spike and closed with prices rising faster than at any
point since 1947, setting up the Great
Inflation’s final act in 1980.
MLA: “Inflation from 1960 to 1979: $100 is worth $245 today.” InflationCalculator.com, U.S. Bureau of Labor Statistics CPI-U data, https://inflationcalculator.com/inflation/1960-to-1979/
APA: InflationCalculator.com. Inflation from 1960 to 1979. Based on U.S. Bureau of Labor Statistics CPI-U data. Retrieved from https://inflationcalculator.com/inflation/1960-to-1979/