$100 in 1960 is worth $515 in 1995,
because prices increased 414.9% over that period, an average of
4.79% a year.
$100 in 1960 has
the same buying power as
$515
in 1995
Detailed inflation statistics
Cumulative price change
414.9%
Average inflation rate
4.79% per year
Converted amount ($100 base)
$515
Price difference ($100 base)
$415
CPI in 1960
29.6
CPI in 1995
152.4
Inflation in 1960
1.72%
Inflation in 1995
2.83%
$100 in 1960 → 1995
$515
$100 in 1995 → 1960
$19.42
What happened to prices between 1960 and 1995
Between 1960 and 1995, the Consumer Price Index went from 29.6 to 152.4.
Cumulatively, prices increased 414.9%, which works out to an average of
4.79% per year. Put differently, a dollar in 1960 bought what
$0.19 buys in 1995: the 1960 dollar
lost 80.6% of its purchasing power over
these 35 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 1995 at the same ratio, 5.15: $1,000 becomes
$5,149, and $10,000 becomes $51,486.
Amount in 1960
Value in 1995
$1.00
$5.15
$5.00
$25.74
$10.00
$51.49
$20.00
$103
$50.00
$257
$100
$515
$500
$2,574
$1,000
$5,149
$5,000
$25,743
$10,000
$51,486
$100,000
$514,865
$1,000,000
$5,148,649
Inflation by spending category, 1960–1995
Between 1960 and 1995, medical care rose the most, up 888.8%, while apparel rose the least, up 188.8%, against 414.9% for all items. The headline number is an average; here is what $100 of 1960
spending costs in 1995, by category:
Category
Avg. yearly inflation
$100 in 1960 →
All items (CPI-U)
4.79%
$515
Medical care
6.77%
$989
Core (all items less food & energy)
4.86%
$527
Food
4.67%
$495
Energy
4.52%
$470
Transportation
4.50%
$467
Apparel
3.08%
$289
Not shown because the BLS began these indexes after 1960: housing (1967–), recreation (1993–), education & communication (1993–).
Decade by decade: 1960 to 1995
Prices climbed fastest in the 1970s, averaging 7.82% a year, and slowest in the 1960s (2.74% a year). Each step below chains into the full 1960–1995 change:
Years
Avg. yearly inflation
Price change
$100 from 1960, at end
1960–1970
2.74%
31.1%
$131
1970–1980
7.82%
112.4%
$278
1980–1990
4.72%
58.6%
$442
1990–1995
3.12%
16.6%
$515
Year by year: CPI and the value of $100 from 1960
$100 from 1960 had already become $220 by
1978, on its way to $515 in 1995; 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.
Long periods are sampled every 2 years; the calculator above covers any pair of years.
The destination year: 1995
In 1995, prices rose 2.8% and $100 from 1960 had the buying
power of $515; the year's average CPI of 152.4 is the level
behind every 1995 figure on this page.
In 1995, gas averaged $1.15 a gallon, a new home cost roughly $133,900, and the median household
earned about $34,100. Inflation ran at 2.8% for the year, little changed from 1994, as the
Federal Reserve shifted from raising rates to cutting them. Having lifted its policy rate six
times the year before, the Fed judged by July that the economy had cooled enough on its own, and
trimmed rates instead, an outcome economists would later point to as a rare soft landing. The
year opened with a currency crisis: Mexico’s peso lost roughly half its value against the dollar
in a matter of weeks, and the U.S. Treasury and the IMF assembled a $50 billion rescue package,
controversial in Congress, to stabilize it and keep the crisis from spreading to other emerging
markets. Closer to home, a budget standoff between President Clinton and the Republican Congress
shut down federal agencies twice, first for five days in November and then for 21 days spanning
December into January 1996, the longest shutdown up to that point. The Postal Service raised the
cost of a first-class stamp to 32 cents in January. Low, steady inflation was about the only calm
part of 1995’s economic story.
MLA: “Inflation from 1960 to 1995: $100 is worth $515 today.” InflationCalculator.com, U.S. Bureau of Labor Statistics CPI-U data, https://inflationcalculator.com/inflation/1960-to-1995/
APA: InflationCalculator.com. Inflation from 1960 to 1995. Based on U.S. Bureau of Labor Statistics CPI-U data. Retrieved from https://inflationcalculator.com/inflation/1960-to-1995/