$100 in 1962 is worth $411 in 1989,
because prices increased 310.6% over that period, an average of
5.37% a year.
$100 in 1962 has
the same buying power as
$411
in 1989
Detailed inflation statistics
Cumulative price change
310.6%
Average inflation rate
5.37% per year
Converted amount ($100 base)
$411
Price difference ($100 base)
$311
CPI in 1962
30.2
CPI in 1989
124
Inflation in 1962
1.00%
Inflation in 1989
4.82%
$100 in 1962 → 1989
$411
$100 in 1989 → 1962
$24.35
What happened to prices between 1962 and 1989
Between 1962 and 1989, the Consumer Price Index went from 30.2 to 124.
Cumulatively, prices increased 310.6%, which works out to an average of
5.37% per year. Put differently, a dollar in 1962 bought what
$0.24 buys in 1989: the 1962 dollar
lost 75.6% of its purchasing power over
these 27 years.
Consumer prices rose 1.0% in 1962, matching 1961’s pace as
inflation stayed remarkably low and unemployment slowly declined from its
recession-era highs. That January, Kennedy’s Council of Economic Advisers
introduced “wage-price guideposts,” non-binding targets meant to keep pay
and price increases in line with productivity growth without formal
controls. The space race delivered a milestone that February, when John
Glenn’s Friendship 7 capsule circled Earth three times, making him the
first American to orbit the planet. Markets got a scare that spring: a
dispute over U.S. Steel’s April price increase, which Kennedy publicly
pressured the company into rolling back, rattled investors, and the Dow
Jones Industrial Average fell about 5.7% on May 28, its steepest one-day
drop since the 1929 crash. The year’s gravest moment came that October,
when American reconnaissance photographed Soviet nuclear missiles in
Cuba, setting off a 13-day standoff that brought the two superpowers
closer to nuclear war than at any other point in the Cold War before the
Soviet Union agreed to remove the missiles in exchange for a U.S. pledge
not to invade the island. Consumer prices finished 1962 205.1% above their
1913 level. First-class postage held at 4 cents, and the
minimum wage stayed at $1.15 an hour.
Every 1962 amount converts to 1989 at the same ratio, 4.11: $1,000 becomes
$4,106, and $10,000 becomes $41,060.
Amount in 1962
Value in 1989
$1.00
$4.11
$5.00
$20.53
$10.00
$41.06
$20.00
$82.12
$50.00
$205
$100
$411
$500
$2,053
$1,000
$4,106
$5,000
$20,530
$10,000
$41,060
$100,000
$410,596
$1,000,000
$4,105,960
Inflation by spending category, 1962–1989
Between 1962 and 1989, medical care rose the most, up 535.3%, while apparel rose the least, up 156.2%, against 310.6% for all items. The headline number is an average; here is what $100 of 1962
spending costs in 1989, by category:
Category
Avg. yearly inflation
$100 in 1962 →
All items (CPI-U)
5.37%
$411
Medical care
7.09%
$635
Energy
5.43%
$417
Core (all items less food & energy)
5.37%
$411
Food
5.35%
$409
Transportation
4.97%
$370
Apparel
3.55%
$256
Not shown because the BLS began these indexes after 1962: housing (1967–), recreation (1993–), education & communication (1993–).
Decade by decade: 1962 to 1989
Prices climbed fastest in the 1970s, averaging 7.82% a year, and slowest in the 1960s (3.18% a year). Each step below chains into the full 1962–1989 change:
Years
Avg. yearly inflation
Price change
$100 from 1962, at end
1962–1970
3.18%
28.5%
$128
1970–1980
7.82%
112.4%
$273
1980–1989
4.65%
50.5%
$411
Year by year: CPI and the value of $100 from 1962
$100 from 1962 had already become $178 by
1975, on its way to $411 in 1989; 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 1.3% in 1964.
In 1989, prices rose 4.8% and $100 from 1962 had the buying
power of $411; the year's average CPI of 124 is the level
behind every 1989 figure on this page.
1989 closed out a decade that began in economic crisis and ended in a long,
calmer expansion. Inflation for the year came in at 4.8%, higher than the
mid-decade lull but still roughly a third of the 13.5% peak that had opened
the decade in 1980. The federal minimum wage, unchanged at $3.35 an hour
since January 1981, had gone longer without an increase than at any point
since Congress created it, and had lost close to a third of its purchasing
power to inflation in the meantime; lawmakers would finally raise it to
$3.80 the following April. The decade’s other unfinished business came due
in August, when Congress passed FIRREA, the law that created the Resolution
Trust Corporation to seize and sell off the hundreds of savings and loan
institutions that a decade of deregulation and risky lending had left
insolvent, a bailout that eventually cost taxpayers over $100 billion. On
Wall Street, the recovery was already complete: the Dow Jones Industrial
Average closed 1989 at a record high, just over two years after Black
Monday’s 22.6% single-day crash, capping the bull market that had begun at
the Dow’s 776 low in August 1982. Between the S&L bailout, a wage floor
eroded by years without a raise, and a stock market at new highs, 1989
captured how unevenly the decade’s disinflation had been felt.
MLA: “Inflation from 1962 to 1989: $100 is worth $411 today.” InflationCalculator.com, U.S. Bureau of Labor Statistics CPI-U data, https://inflationcalculator.com/inflation/1962-to-1989/
APA: InflationCalculator.com. Inflation from 1962 to 1989. Based on U.S. Bureau of Labor Statistics CPI-U data. Retrieved from https://inflationcalculator.com/inflation/1962-to-1989/