$100 in 1962 is worth $520 in 1996,
because prices increased 419.5% over that period, an average of
4.97% a year.
$100 in 1962 has
the same buying power as
$520
in 1996
Detailed inflation statistics
Cumulative price change
419.5%
Average inflation rate
4.97% per year
Converted amount ($100 base)
$520
Price difference ($100 base)
$420
CPI in 1962
30.2
CPI in 1996
156.9
Inflation in 1962
1.00%
Inflation in 1996
2.95%
$100 in 1962 → 1996
$520
$100 in 1996 → 1962
$19.25
What happened to prices between 1962 and 1996
Between 1962 and 1996, the Consumer Price Index went from 30.2 to 156.9.
Cumulatively, prices increased 419.5%, which works out to an average of
4.97% per year. Put differently, a dollar in 1962 bought what
$0.19 buys in 1996: the 1962 dollar
lost 80.8% of its purchasing power over
these 34 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 1996 at the same ratio, 5.20: $1,000 becomes
$5,195, and $10,000 becomes $51,954.
Amount in 1962
Value in 1996
$1.00
$5.20
$5.00
$25.98
$10.00
$51.95
$20.00
$104
$50.00
$260
$100
$520
$500
$2,598
$1,000
$5,195
$5,000
$25,977
$10,000
$51,954
$100,000
$519,536
$1,000,000
$5,195,364
Inflation by spending category, 1962–1996
Between 1962 and 1996, medical care rose the most, up 871.1%, while apparel rose the least, up 184.4%, against 419.5% for all items. The headline number is an average; here is what $100 of 1962
spending costs in 1996, by category:
Category
Avg. yearly inflation
$100 in 1962 →
All items (CPI-U)
4.97%
$520
Medical care
6.91%
$971
Core (all items less food & energy)
5.01%
$527
Food
4.85%
$501
Energy
4.77%
$487
Transportation
4.62%
$464
Apparel
3.12%
$284
Not shown because the BLS began these indexes after 1962: housing (1967–), recreation (1993–), education & communication (1993–).
Decade by decade: 1962 to 1996
Prices climbed fastest in the 1970s, averaging 7.82% a year, and slowest in the 1990s (3.09% a year). Each step below chains into the full 1962–1996 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
1980–1990
4.72%
58.6%
$433
1990–1996
3.09%
20.0%
$520
Year by year: CPI and the value of $100 from 1962
$100 from 1962 had already become $216 by
1978, on its way to $520 in 1996; 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.
Long periods are sampled every 2 years; the calculator above covers any pair of years.
The destination year: 1996
In 1996, prices rose 3.0% and $100 from 1962 had the buying
power of $520; the year's average CPI of 156.9 is the level
behind every 1996 figure on this page.
The median household earned about $35,500 in 1996, gas averaged $1.23 a gallon, up noticeably
from the mid-decade lull, and a new home cost roughly $140,000. Inflation ran at 3.0% for the
year, ticking back up from 1995 as energy prices firmed. Washington passed two of the decade’s
more consequential laws that year: in February, the Telecommunications Act rewrote the rules for
phone, cable, and broadcast media for the first time since 1934, opening local markets to
competition and easing ownership limits; in August, a welfare overhaul ended the federal
guarantee of cash assistance, replacing it with block grants to states and time limits on
benefits. In October, the federal minimum wage rose to $4.75 an hour, its first increase in five
years and the opening step of a two-part law that would take it to $5.15 the following
September. Two sweeping new laws and a minimum wage finally on the move again made 1996 a year
that changed more about how the economy was governed than about how fast prices moved.
MLA: “Inflation from 1962 to 1996: $100 is worth $520 today.” InflationCalculator.com, U.S. Bureau of Labor Statistics CPI-U data, https://inflationcalculator.com/inflation/1962-to-1996/
APA: InflationCalculator.com. Inflation from 1962 to 1996. Based on U.S. Bureau of Labor Statistics CPI-U data. Retrieved from https://inflationcalculator.com/inflation/1962-to-1996/