$100 in 1962 is worth $710 in 2009,
because prices increased 610.4% over that period, an average of
4.26% a year.
$100 in 1962 has
the same buying power as
$710
in 2009
Detailed inflation statistics
Cumulative price change
610.4%
Average inflation rate
4.26% per year
Converted amount ($100 base)
$710
Price difference ($100 base)
$610
CPI in 1962
30.2
CPI in 2009
214.537
Inflation in 1962
1.00%
Inflation in 2009
-0.36%
$100 in 1962 → 2009
$710
$100 in 2009 → 1962
$14.08
What happened to prices between 1962 and 2009
Between 1962 and 2009, the Consumer Price Index went from 30.2 to 214.537.
Cumulatively, prices increased 610.4%, which works out to an average of
4.26% per year. Put differently, a dollar in 1962 bought what
$0.14 buys in 2009: the 1962 dollar
lost 85.9% of its purchasing power over
these 47 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 2009 at the same ratio, 7.10: $1,000 becomes
$7,104, and $10,000 becomes $71,039.
Amount in 1962
Value in 2009
$1.00
$7.10
$5.00
$35.52
$10.00
$71.04
$20.00
$142
$50.00
$355
$100
$710
$500
$3,552
$1,000
$7,104
$5,000
$35,519
$10,000
$71,039
$100,000
$710,387
$1,000,000
$7,103,874
Inflation by spending category, 1962–2009
Between 1962 and 2009, medical care rose the most, up 1498.4%, while apparel rose the least, up 159.3%, against 610.4% for all items. The headline number is an average; here is what $100 of 1962
spending costs in 2009, by category:
Category
Avg. yearly inflation
$100 in 1962 →
All items (CPI-U)
4.26%
$710
Medical care
6.07%
$1,598
Energy
4.67%
$855
Food
4.27%
$712
Core (all items less food & energy)
4.22%
$698
Transportation
3.82%
$582
Apparel
2.05%
$259
Not shown because the BLS began these indexes after 1962: housing (1967–), recreation (1993–), education & communication (1993–).
Decade by decade: 1962 to 2009
Prices climbed fastest in the 1970s, averaging 7.82% a year, and slowest in the 2000s (2.47% a year). Each step below chains into the full 1962–2009 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
1990–2000
2.80%
31.8%
$570
2000–2009
2.47%
24.6%
$710
Year by year: CPI and the value of $100 from 1962
$100 from 1962 had already become $363 by
1986, on its way to $710 in 2009; 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: 2009
In 2009, prices fell 0.4% and $100 from 1962 had the buying
power of $710; the year's average CPI of 214.537 is the level
behind every 2009 figure on this page.
2009 is the rarest kind of year in the modern price data: one where the cost
of living went down. The CPI fell 0.4%, the first full-year deflation
since 1955, as the Great Recession hollowed out demand and oil unwound from
its $147 spike the summer before. Gasoline that had cost over $4 a gallon in
July 2008 averaged $2.35 in 2009, and that energy collapse dragged the
12-month inflation rate to −2.1% by July, the deepest reading since 1950.
Policymakers treated falling prices not as relief but as a warning: deflation
raises the real weight of debt precisely when households are drowning in it,
which is why the Federal Reserve pinned interest rates near zero, began buying
bonds by the hundreds of billions, and Washington passed a $787 billion
stimulus. The medicine took: prices stabilized within a year, and 2009 remains
the textbook case of why central banks fear deflation more than moderate
inflation.
MLA: “Inflation from 1962 to 2009: $100 is worth $710 today.” InflationCalculator.com, U.S. Bureau of Labor Statistics CPI-U data, https://inflationcalculator.com/inflation/1962-to-2009/
APA: InflationCalculator.com. Inflation from 1962 to 2009. Based on U.S. Bureau of Labor Statistics CPI-U data. Retrieved from https://inflationcalculator.com/inflation/1962-to-2009/