$100 in 1963 is worth $237 in 1979,
because prices increased 137.3% over that period, an average of
5.55% a year.
$100 in 1963 has
the same buying power as
$237
in 1979
Detailed inflation statistics
Cumulative price change
137.3%
Average inflation rate
5.55% per year
Converted amount ($100 base)
$237
Price difference ($100 base)
$137
CPI in 1963
30.6
CPI in 1979
72.6
Inflation in 1963
1.32%
Inflation in 1979
11.35%
$100 in 1963 → 1979
$237
$100 in 1979 → 1963
$42.15
What happened to prices between 1963 and 1979
Between 1963 and 1979, the Consumer Price Index went from 30.6 to 72.6.
Cumulatively, prices increased 137.3%, which works out to an average of
5.55% per year. Put differently, a dollar in 1963 bought what
$0.42 buys in 1979: the 1963 dollar
lost 57.9% of its purchasing power over
these 16 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 1979 at the same ratio, 2.37: $1,000 becomes
$2,373, and $10,000 becomes $23,725.
Amount in 1963
Value in 1979
$1.00
$2.37
$5.00
$11.86
$10.00
$23.73
$20.00
$47.45
$50.00
$119
$100
$237
$500
$1,186
$1,000
$2,373
$5,000
$11,863
$10,000
$23,725
$100,000
$237,255
$1,000,000
$2,372,549
Inflation by spending category, 1963–1979
Between 1963 and 1979, energy rose the most, up 190.7%, while apparel rose the least, up 81.0%, against 137.3% for all items. The headline number is an average; here is what $100 of 1963
spending costs in 1979, by category:
Category
Avg. yearly inflation
$100 in 1963 →
All items (CPI-U)
5.55%
$237
Energy
6.90%
$291
Medical care
6.65%
$280
Food
6.07%
$257
Transportation
5.29%
$228
Core (all items less food & energy)
5.23%
$226
Apparel
3.78%
$181
Not shown because the BLS began these indexes after 1963: housing (1967–), recreation (1993–), education & communication (1993–).
Decade by decade: 1963 to 1979
Prices climbed fastest in the 1970s, averaging 7.21% a year, and slowest in the 1960s (3.45% a year). Each step below chains into the full 1963–1979 change:
Years
Avg. yearly inflation
Price change
$100 from 1963, at end
1963–1970
3.45%
26.8%
$127
1970–1979
7.21%
87.1%
$237
Year by year: CPI and the value of $100 from 1963
$100 from 1963 had already become $132 by
1971, on its way to $237 in 1979; each row shows the CPI, that
year's inflation rate, and the running value.
Within the span, inflation peaked at 11.3% in 1979, and the smallest rise was 1.3% in 1964.
In 1979, prices rose 11.3% and $100 from 1963 had the buying
power of $237; the year's average CPI of 72.6 is the level
behind every 1979 figure on this page.
Consumer prices rose 11.3% in 1979, the fastest pace since 1947 and the
decade’s second bout of double-digit inflation after 1974’s
11.0%. The trigger was familiar: the Iranian Revolution that January halted
Iran’s oil exports, and panic buying amplified the shortage, sending crude
prices sharply higher over the year and motorists back into gas lines, with
some states reviving the odd-even rationing last seen in 1974. Paul Volcker,
appointed Federal Reserve chairman that August, responded with a strategy
shift announced that October: the Fed would target the money supply directly
and let interest rates rise as high as necessary to break inflation, whatever
the short-term cost. That cost would arrive as a deep recession in 1981-82,
but by year’s end 1979 had already delivered enough turmoil on its own. A
reactor at the Three Mile Island plant near Harrisburg, Pennsylvania,
suffered a partial core meltdown that March 28, the worst commercial nuclear
accident in U.S. history, and on November 4, militants in Tehran stormed the
U.S. embassy and took 52 Americans hostage, beginning a 444-day crisis that
consumed the rest of Carter’s presidency. A median household earned $16,461
in 1979, a new home sold for a median $62,900, and gas jumped to 86 cents a
gallon. Consumer prices finished the decade 97.8% above where they stood in
1969, very nearly doubling in ten years, and stood 633.3%
above their 1913 level. The 1970s had opened with inflation
cooling from the 1969 spike and closed with prices rising faster than at any
point since 1947, setting up the Great
Inflation’s final act in 1980.
MLA: “Inflation from 1963 to 1979: $100 is worth $237 today.” InflationCalculator.com, U.S. Bureau of Labor Statistics CPI-U data, https://inflationcalculator.com/inflation/1963-to-1979/
APA: InflationCalculator.com. Inflation from 1963 to 1979. Based on U.S. Bureau of Labor Statistics CPI-U data. Retrieved from https://inflationcalculator.com/inflation/1963-to-1979/