$100 in 1963 is worth $588 in 2002,
because prices increased 487.9% over that period, an average of
4.65% a year.
$100 in 1963 has
the same buying power as
$588
in 2002
Detailed inflation statistics
Cumulative price change
487.9%
Average inflation rate
4.65% per year
Converted amount ($100 base)
$588
Price difference ($100 base)
$488
CPI in 1963
30.6
CPI in 2002
179.9
Inflation in 1963
1.32%
Inflation in 2002
1.58%
$100 in 1963 → 2002
$588
$100 in 2002 → 1963
$17.01
What happened to prices between 1963 and 2002
Between 1963 and 2002, the Consumer Price Index went from 30.6 to 179.9.
Cumulatively, prices increased 487.9%, which works out to an average of
4.65% per year. Put differently, a dollar in 1963 bought what
$0.17 buys in 2002: the 1963 dollar
lost 83.0% of its purchasing power over
these 39 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 2002 at the same ratio, 5.88: $1,000 becomes
$5,879, and $10,000 becomes $58,791.
Amount in 1963
Value in 2002
$1.00
$5.88
$5.00
$29.40
$10.00
$58.79
$20.00
$118
$50.00
$294
$100
$588
$500
$2,940
$1,000
$5,879
$5,000
$29,395
$10,000
$58,791
$100,000
$587,908
$1,000,000
$5,879,085
Inflation by spending category, 1963–2002
Between 1963 and 2002, medical care rose the most, up 1085.1%, while apparel rose the least, up 164.4%, against 487.9% for all items. The headline number is an average; here is what $100 of 1963
spending costs in 2002, by category:
Category
Avg. yearly inflation
$100 in 1963 →
All items (CPI-U)
4.65%
$588
Medical care
6.54%
$1,185
Core (all items less food & energy)
4.70%
$599
Food
4.55%
$567
Energy
4.41%
$538
Transportation
4.19%
$495
Apparel
2.52%
$264
Not shown because the BLS began these indexes after 1963: housing (1967–), recreation (1993–), education & communication (1993–).
Decade by decade: 1963 to 2002
Prices climbed fastest in the 1970s, averaging 7.82% a year, and slowest in the 2000s (2.21% a year). Each step below chains into the full 1963–2002 change:
Years
Avg. yearly inflation
Price change
$100 from 1963, at end
1963–1970
3.45%
26.8%
$127
1970–1980
7.82%
112.4%
$269
1980–1990
4.72%
58.6%
$427
1990–2000
2.80%
31.8%
$563
2000–2002
2.21%
4.5%
$588
Year by year: CPI and the value of $100 from 1963
$100 from 1963 had already become $325 by
1983, on its way to $588 in 2002; 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: 2002
In 2002, prices rose 1.6% and $100 from 1963 had the buying
power of $588; the year's average CPI of 179.9 is the level
behind every 2002 figure on this page.
The CPI rose 1.6% in 2002, the lowest annual rate of the decade so far, with gasoline down to an
average of $1.36 a gallon and slack in the labor market keeping wage pressure low. The median
household earned about $42,400, and a new home cost roughly $187,600, an increase of about 7%
from the year before as low mortgage rates began to lift housing. The Federal Reserve cut its
policy rate to 1.25% in November. Stocks were moving the other way: after the Enron and WorldCom
scandals, the S&P 500 hit its bear-market low on October 9, about 49% below its March 2000
peak, and Congress passed the Sarbanes-Oxley Act in July to tighten corporate accounting rules.
On January 1, euro banknotes and coins replaced national currencies in 12 European countries. A
first-class stamp rose to 37 cents in June, and the federal minimum wage stayed at $5.15.
MLA: “Inflation from 1963 to 2002: $100 is worth $588 today.” InflationCalculator.com, U.S. Bureau of Labor Statistics CPI-U data, https://inflationcalculator.com/inflation/1963-to-2002/
APA: InflationCalculator.com. Inflation from 1963 to 2002. Based on U.S. Bureau of Labor Statistics CPI-U data. Retrieved from https://inflationcalculator.com/inflation/1963-to-2002/