$100 in 1963 is worth $617 in 2004,
because prices increased 517.3% over that period, an average of
4.54% a year.
$100 in 1963 has
the same buying power as
$617
in 2004
Detailed inflation statistics
Cumulative price change
517.3%
Average inflation rate
4.54% per year
Converted amount ($100 base)
$617
Price difference ($100 base)
$517
CPI in 1963
30.6
CPI in 2004
188.9
Inflation in 1963
1.32%
Inflation in 2004
2.66%
$100 in 1963 → 2004
$617
$100 in 2004 → 1963
$16.20
What happened to prices between 1963 and 2004
Between 1963 and 2004, the Consumer Price Index went from 30.6 to 188.9.
Cumulatively, prices increased 517.3%, which works out to an average of
4.54% per year. Put differently, a dollar in 1963 bought what
$0.16 buys in 2004: the 1963 dollar
lost 83.8% of its purchasing power over
these 41 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 2004 at the same ratio, 6.17: $1,000 becomes
$6,173, and $10,000 becomes $61,732.
Amount in 1963
Value in 2004
$1.00
$6.17
$5.00
$30.87
$10.00
$61.73
$20.00
$123
$50.00
$309
$100
$617
$500
$3,087
$1,000
$6,173
$5,000
$30,866
$10,000
$61,732
$100,000
$617,320
$1,000,000
$6,173,203
Inflation by spending category, 1963–2004
Between 1963 and 2004, medical care rose the most, up 1186.7%, while apparel rose the least, up 156.7%, against 517.3% for all items. The headline number is an average; here is what $100 of 1963
spending costs in 2004, by category:
Category
Avg. yearly inflation
$100 in 1963 →
All items (CPI-U)
4.54%
$617
Medical care
6.43%
$1,287
Energy
4.75%
$670
Core (all items less food & energy)
4.54%
$618
Food
4.46%
$599
Transportation
4.14%
$528
Apparel
2.33%
$257
Not shown because the BLS began these indexes after 1963: housing (1967–), recreation (1993–), education & communication (1993–).
Decade by decade: 1963 to 2004
Prices climbed fastest in the 1970s, averaging 7.82% a year, and slowest in the 2000s (2.34% a year). Each step below chains into the full 1963–2004 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
2000–2004
2.34%
9.7%
$617
Year by year: CPI and the value of $100 from 1963
$100 from 1963 had already become $325 by
1983, on its way to $617 in 2004; 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: 2004
In 2004, prices rose 2.7% and $100 from 1963 had the buying
power of $617; the year's average CPI of 188.9 is the level
behind every 2004 figure on this page.
Consumer prices rose 2.7% in 2004, with a 29-cent jump in the price of gasoline, to $1.88 a
gallon, doing much of the work. Crude oil passed $50 a barrel in October on rising demand
from China and India. The Federal Reserve raised rates for the first time in four years on
June 30, to 1.25%, and it kept going: 17 consecutive quarter-point increases took the rate to
5.25% by June 2006. Housing was already running ahead of incomes. The median household earned
about $44,300, up 2.3% from 2003, while the median new home sold for $221,000, up about 13%. A
first-class stamp stayed at 37 cents and the federal minimum wage at $5.15, unchanged since
1997.
MLA: “Inflation from 1963 to 2004: $100 is worth $617 today.” InflationCalculator.com, U.S. Bureau of Labor Statistics CPI-U data, https://inflationcalculator.com/inflation/1963-to-2004/
APA: InflationCalculator.com. Inflation from 1963 to 2004. Based on U.S. Bureau of Labor Statistics CPI-U data. Retrieved from https://inflationcalculator.com/inflation/1963-to-2004/