$100 in 1961 is worth $752 in 2011,
because prices increased 652.3% over that period, an average of
4.12% a year.
$100 in 1961 has
the same buying power as
$752
in 2011
Detailed inflation statistics
Cumulative price change
652.3%
Average inflation rate
4.12% per year
Converted amount ($100 base)
$752
Price difference ($100 base)
$652
CPI in 1961
29.9
CPI in 2011
224.939
Inflation in 1961
1.01%
Inflation in 2011
3.16%
$100 in 1961 → 2011
$752
$100 in 2011 → 1961
$13.29
What happened to prices between 1961 and 2011
Between 1961 and 2011, the Consumer Price Index went from 29.9 to 224.939.
Cumulatively, prices increased 652.3%, which works out to an average of
4.12% per year. Put differently, a dollar in 1961 bought what
$0.13 buys in 2011: the 1961 dollar
lost 86.7% of its purchasing power over
these 50 years.
Consumer prices rose 1.0% in 1961, down from 1960’s 1.7% as
the economy climbed out of recession, a recovery the National Bureau of
Economic Research dates to that February. Politically, the year opened
with a changing of the guard: outgoing president Dwight Eisenhower’s
farewell address on January 17 warned of a growing “military-industrial
complex,” and three days later John F. Kennedy was sworn in, urging
Americans to “ask not what your country can do for you.” The new
administration’s first major foreign-policy test came quickly and badly:
a CIA-organized force of Cuban exiles landed at the Bay of Pigs on April
17 aiming to topple Fidel Castro, and without the U.S. air support Kennedy
withheld, the invasion collapsed within three days. Cold War tensions
hardened further that August, when East German forces sealed the border
between East and West Berlin overnight, building what would become the
Berlin Wall and stopping the flow of refugees to the West. Domestically,
the wage floor moved for the first time in five years: the Fair Labor
Standards Amendments of 1961, effective that September, raised the
minimum wage to $1.15 an hour and extended coverage to roughly 3.6 million
additional workers. Consumer prices finished 1961 202.0% above their
1913 level. First-class postage held at 4 cents.
Every 1961 amount converts to 2011 at the same ratio, 7.52: $1,000 becomes
$7,523, and $10,000 becomes $75,230.
Amount in 1961
Value in 2011
$1.00
$7.52
$5.00
$37.62
$10.00
$75.23
$20.00
$150
$50.00
$376
$100
$752
$500
$3,762
$1,000
$7,523
$5,000
$37,615
$10,000
$75,230
$100,000
$752,304
$1,000,000
$7,523,043
Inflation by spending category, 1961–2011
Between 1961 and 2011, medical care rose the most, up 1647.9%, while apparel rose the least, up 164.9%, against 652.3% for all items. The headline number is an average; here is what $100 of 1961
spending costs in 2011, by category:
Category
Avg. yearly inflation
$100 in 1961 →
All items (CPI-U)
4.12%
$752
Medical care
5.89%
$1,748
Energy
4.88%
$1,084
Food
4.11%
$749
Core (all items less food & energy)
4.04%
$726
Transportation
3.98%
$706
Apparel
1.97%
$265
Not shown because the BLS began these indexes after 1961: housing (1967–), recreation (1993–), education & communication (1993–).
Decade by decade: 1961 to 2011
Prices climbed fastest in the 1970s, averaging 7.82% a year, and slowest in the 2000s (2.39% a year). Each step below chains into the full 1961–2011 change:
Years
Avg. yearly inflation
Price change
$100 from 1961, at end
1961–1970
2.94%
29.8%
$130
1970–1980
7.82%
112.4%
$276
1980–1990
4.72%
58.6%
$437
1990–2000
2.80%
31.8%
$576
2000–2010
2.39%
26.6%
$729
2010–2011
3.16%
3.2%
$752
Year by year: CPI and the value of $100 from 1961
$100 from 1961 had already become $360 by
1985, on its way to $752 in 2011; 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 2 years; the calculator above covers any pair of years.
The destination year: 2011
In 2011, prices rose 3.2% and $100 from 1961 had the buying
power of $752; the year's average CPI of 224.939 is the level
behind every 2011 figure on this page.
2011 brought the fastest inflation of the post-recession recovery. Consumer
prices rose 3.2%, roughly double the 2010 pace, and the cause was mostly at the
pump and the grocery store. Unrest across the Middle East and North Africa,
including the war in Libya, pushed gasoline to an annual average of $3.52 a
gallon, the highest yearly figure recorded to that point. Food prices also
rose faster than the overall index.
Household budgets did not keep up. The median household income was $50,054,
barely above the year before, and the median new home sold for about $227,200.
The federal minimum wage stayed at $7.25 and a first-class stamp at 44 cents.
Policy stayed loose. The Federal Reserve kept its policy rate near zero and
launched Operation Twist in September to lower long-term rates. Washington
spent the summer in a debt-ceiling fight that ended in S&P’s August downgrade
of the U.S. credit rating. The inflation spike proved temporary: the
2011 rate was the high point of the early 2010s, and prices grew more slowly
in every year that followed until 2017.
MLA: “Inflation from 1961 to 2011: $100 is worth $752 today.” InflationCalculator.com, U.S. Bureau of Labor Statistics CPI-U data, https://inflationcalculator.com/inflation/1961-to-2011/
APA: InflationCalculator.com. Inflation from 1961 to 2011. Based on U.S. Bureau of Labor Statistics CPI-U data. Retrieved from https://inflationcalculator.com/inflation/1961-to-2011/