$100 in 1960 is worth $989 in 2022,
because prices increased 888.7% over that period, an average of
3.76% a year.
$100 in 1960 has
the same buying power as
$989
in 2022
Detailed inflation statistics
Cumulative price change
888.7%
Average inflation rate
3.76% per year
Converted amount ($100 base)
$989
Price difference ($100 base)
$889
CPI in 1960
29.6
CPI in 2022
292.655
Inflation in 1960
1.72%
Inflation in 2022
8.00%
$100 in 1960 → 2022
$989
$100 in 2022 → 1960
$10.11
What happened to prices between 1960 and 2022
Between 1960 and 2022, the Consumer Price Index went from 29.6 to 292.655.
Cumulatively, prices increased 888.7%, which works out to an average of
3.76% per year. Put differently, a dollar in 1960 bought what
$0.10 buys in 2022: the 1960 dollar
lost 89.9% of its purchasing power over
these 62 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 2022 at the same ratio, 9.89: $1,000 becomes
$9,887, and $10,000 becomes $98,870.
Amount in 1960
Value in 2022
$1.00
$9.89
$5.00
$49.43
$10.00
$98.87
$20.00
$198
$50.00
$494
$100
$989
$500
$4,943
$1,000
$9,887
$5,000
$49,435
$10,000
$98,870
$100,000
$988,699
$1,000,000
$9,886,993
Inflation by spending category, 1960–2022
Between 1960 and 2022, medical care rose the most, up 2350.9%, while apparel rose the least, up 178.1%, against 888.7% for all items. The headline number is an average; here is what $100 of 1960
spending costs in 2022, by category:
Category
Avg. yearly inflation
$100 in 1960 →
All items (CPI-U)
3.76%
$989
Medical care
5.30%
$2,451
Energy
4.26%
$1,332
Food
3.81%
$1,018
Core (all items less food & energy)
3.72%
$962
Transportation
3.60%
$894
Apparel
1.66%
$278
Not shown because the BLS began these indexes after 1960: housing (1967–), recreation (1993–), education & communication (1993–).
Decade by decade: 1960 to 2022
Prices climbed fastest in the 1970s, averaging 7.82% a year, and slowest in the 2010s (1.73% a year). Each step below chains into the full 1960–2022 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
1990–2000
2.80%
31.8%
$582
2000–2010
2.39%
26.6%
$737
2010–2020
1.73%
18.7%
$874
2020–2022
6.34%
13.1%
$989
Year by year: CPI and the value of $100 from 1960
$100 from 1960 had already become $442 by
1990, on its way to $989 in 2022; 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 prices fell 0.4% in 2009, the deepest deflation of the period.
Long periods are sampled every 5 years; the calculator above covers any pair of years.
The destination year: 2022
In 2022, prices rose 8.0% and $100 from 1960 had the buying
power of $989; the year's average CPI of 292.655 is the level
behind every 2022 figure on this page.
2022 was the year inflation returned. Consumer prices rose 8.0% on average,
the worst since 1981, driven by pandemic-era supply chains, stimulus-fueled
demand, and an energy shock from the war in Ukraine. Gas briefly topped $5 a
gallon nationally for the first time ever, and “inflation” became the
top-ranked economic concern in nearly every poll of American households.
MLA: “Inflation from 1960 to 2022: $100 is worth $989 today.” InflationCalculator.com, U.S. Bureau of Labor Statistics CPI-U data, https://inflationcalculator.com/inflation/1960-to-2022/
APA: InflationCalculator.com. Inflation from 1960 to 2022. Based on U.S. Bureau of Labor Statistics CPI-U data. Retrieved from https://inflationcalculator.com/inflation/1960-to-2022/