$100 in 1963 is worth $132 in 1971,
because prices increased 32.4% over that period, an average of
3.57% a year.
$100 in 1963 has
the same buying power as
$132
in 1971
Detailed inflation statistics
Cumulative price change
32.4%
Average inflation rate
3.57% per year
Converted amount ($100 base)
$132
Price difference ($100 base)
$32.35
CPI in 1963
30.6
CPI in 1971
40.5
Inflation in 1963
1.32%
Inflation in 1971
4.38%
$100 in 1963 → 1971
$132
$100 in 1971 → 1963
$75.56
What happened to prices between 1963 and 1971
Between 1963 and 1971, the Consumer Price Index went from 30.6 to 40.5.
Cumulatively, prices increased 32.4%, which works out to an average of
3.57% per year. Put differently, a dollar in 1963 bought what
$0.76 buys in 1971: the 1963 dollar
lost 24.4% of its purchasing power over
these 8 years.
Consumer prices rose 1.3% in 1963, up slightly from 1962’s
1.0% as the expansion entered its third year with inflation still low,
conditions that gave Kennedy room to push the large tax cut he had
proposed to Congress. The cost of a first-class stamp rose that January
7, to 5 cents from 4 cents, the first postal rate change since 1958. That
August 28, Martin Luther King Jr. delivered his “I Have a Dream” speech
from the steps of the Lincoln Memorial to a quarter million people
gathered for the March on Washington, building pressure on Congress to
pass the civil rights bill Kennedy had proposed that June. The year ended
in tragedy: Kennedy was assassinated while riding in a motorcade through
Dallas on November 22, and Lyndon B. Johnson was sworn in aboard Air Force
One that same afternoon. Johnson would spend the following year pushing
Kennedy’s stalled tax and civil rights agenda through Congress. The
minimum wage rose again that September, to $1.25 an hour, the second step
of the phased increase set two years earlier. Consumer prices finished
1963 209.1% above their 1913 level.
Every 1963 amount converts to 1971 at the same ratio, 1.32: $1,000 becomes
$1,324, and $10,000 becomes $13,235.
Amount in 1963
Value in 1971
$1.00
$1.32
$5.00
$6.62
$10.00
$13.24
$20.00
$26.47
$50.00
$66.18
$100
$132
$500
$662
$1,000
$1,324
$5,000
$6,618
$10,000
$13,235
$100,000
$132,353
$1,000,000
$1,323,529
Inflation by spending category, 1963–1971
Between 1963 and 1971, medical care rose the most, up 49.8%, while energy rose the least, up 17.3%, against 32.4% for all items. The headline number is an average; here is what $100 of 1963
spending costs in 1971, by category:
Category
Avg. yearly inflation
$100 in 1963 →
All items (CPI-U)
3.57%
$132
Medical care
5.18%
$150
Core (all items less food & energy)
3.75%
$134
Apparel
3.36%
$130
Food
3.32%
$130
Transportation
3.12%
$128
Energy
2.01%
$117
Not shown because the BLS began these indexes after 1963: housing (1967–), recreation (1993–), education & communication (1993–).
Decade by decade: 1963 to 1971
Prices climbed fastest in the 1970s, averaging 4.38% a year, and slowest in the 1960s (3.45% a year). Each step below chains into the full 1963–1971 change:
Years
Avg. yearly inflation
Price change
$100 from 1963, at end
1963–1970
3.45%
26.8%
$127
1970–1971
4.38%
4.4%
$132
Year by year: CPI and the value of $100 from 1963
$100 from 1963 had already become $109 by
1967, on its way to $132 in 1971; each row shows the CPI, that
year's inflation rate, and the running value.
Within the span, inflation peaked at 5.7% in 1970, and the smallest rise was 1.3% in 1964.
In 1971, prices rose 4.4% and $100 from 1963 had the buying
power of $132; the year's average CPI of 40.5 is the level
behind every 1971 figure on this page.
Consumer prices rose 4.4% in 1971, down from 1970’s 5.7% as
the recession that started in December 1969 finally cooled demand. The bigger
economic story came that August 15, when President Nixon closed the “gold
window” that let foreign governments exchange dollars for gold, ending the
Bretton Woods system that had anchored the dollar since World War II. The
same address announced a 90-day freeze on wages and prices, the first
peacetime controls the country had seen, an attempt to break inflationary
expectations without the slower grind of tighter money. The “Nixon Shock,” as
it came to be known, let the dollar float against other currencies for the
first time and set the stage for a wage-and-price-control regime that would
run in various forms into 1973. Politically, the country lowered its voting
age that year: the 26th Amendment, ratified July 1, extended the vote to
18-year-olds, capping a campaign built on the argument that men old enough to
be drafted to Vietnam were old enough to vote for the people who sent them.
The Postal Service, independent since 1970’s reorganization, raised
first-class postage from 6 to 8 cents that May. A median household earned
$9,028 in 1971, up from $8,734 the year before, while gas held near 36 cents
a gallon and a new home sold for a median $25,200. Consumer prices stood
309.1% above their 1913 level by year’s end, still years away
from the double-digit inflation the controls were meant to prevent.
MLA: “Inflation from 1963 to 1971: $100 is worth $132 today.” InflationCalculator.com, U.S. Bureau of Labor Statistics CPI-U data, https://inflationcalculator.com/inflation/1963-to-1971/
APA: InflationCalculator.com. Inflation from 1963 to 1971. Based on U.S. Bureau of Labor Statistics CPI-U data. Retrieved from https://inflationcalculator.com/inflation/1963-to-1971/