$100 in 1963 is worth $886 in 2021,
because prices increased 785.5% over that period, an average of
3.83% a year.
$100 in 1963 has
the same buying power as
$886
in 2021
Detailed inflation statistics
Cumulative price change
785.5%
Average inflation rate
3.83% per year
Converted amount ($100 base)
$886
Price difference ($100 base)
$786
CPI in 1963
30.6
CPI in 2021
270.97
Inflation in 1963
1.32%
Inflation in 2021
4.70%
$100 in 1963 → 2021
$886
$100 in 2021 → 1963
$11.29
What happened to prices between 1963 and 2021
Between 1963 and 2021, the Consumer Price Index went from 30.6 to 270.97.
Cumulatively, prices increased 785.5%, which works out to an average of
3.83% per year. Put differently, a dollar in 1963 bought what
$0.11 buys in 2021: the 1963 dollar
lost 88.7% of its purchasing power over
these 58 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 2021 at the same ratio, 8.86: $1,000 becomes
$8,855, and $10,000 becomes $88,552.
Amount in 1963
Value in 2021
$1.00
$8.86
$5.00
$44.28
$10.00
$88.55
$20.00
$177
$50.00
$443
$100
$886
$500
$4,428
$1,000
$8,855
$5,000
$44,276
$10,000
$88,552
$100,000
$885,523
$1,000,000
$8,855,229
Inflation by spending category, 1963–2021
Between 1963 and 2021, medical care rose the most, up 2079.6%, while apparel rose the least, up 158.0%, against 785.5% for all items. The headline number is an average; here is what $100 of 1963
spending costs in 2021, by category:
Category
Avg. yearly inflation
$100 in 1963 →
All items (CPI-U)
3.83%
$886
Medical care
5.46%
$2,180
Energy
4.15%
$1,055
Food
3.85%
$893
Core (all items less food & energy)
3.80%
$872
Transportation
3.53%
$746
Apparel
1.65%
$258
Not shown because the BLS began these indexes after 1963: housing (1967–), recreation (1993–), education & communication (1993–).
Decade by decade: 1963 to 2021
Prices climbed fastest in the 1970s, averaging 7.82% a year, and slowest in the 2010s (1.73% a year). Each step below chains into the full 1963–2021 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
2000–2010
2.39%
26.6%
$713
2010–2020
1.73%
18.7%
$846
2020–2021
4.70%
4.7%
$886
Year by year: CPI and the value of $100 from 1963
$100 from 1963 had already become $445 by
1991, on its way to $886 in 2021; 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: 2021
In 2021, prices rose 4.7% and $100 from 1963 had the buying
power of $886; the year's average CPI of 270.97 is the level
behind every 2021 figure on this page.
2021 was the year inflation stopped being background noise. Consumer prices
rose 4.7% on average for the year, and the pace kept building as the months
went on: by December, the 12-month rate had reached 7.0%, the highest since
1982. The proximate cause was a supply chain that could not keep up with a
fast-reopening economy. A global semiconductor shortage choked new car
production and pushed used vehicle prices up by more than a third, the
single largest line item in the year’s inflation math. Lumber, appliances,
and shipping capacity told versions of the same story: demand snapped back
faster than factories, ports, and truckers could handle it. Washington added
fuel in March with the $1.9 trillion American Rescue Plan, on top of the
relief already in the pipeline since 2020. For most of the year, the Federal
Reserve called the price surge “transitory,” a temporary reopening effect
expected to fade on its own, and held its policy rate near zero. By
November, with inflation still climbing, the Fed reversed course and began
winding down its bond purchases, the first step toward the rate hikes that
would follow in 2022. Gas averaged $3.01 a gallon for the year, up from
about $2.17 in 2020, while the federal minimum wage held at $7.25,
unchanged since 2009. In hindsight, 2021 reads as the hinge year: the point
where “transitory” inflation became the multi-year fight the Fed spent the
next two years trying to win.
MLA: “Inflation from 1963 to 2021: $100 is worth $886 today.” InflationCalculator.com, U.S. Bureau of Labor Statistics CPI-U data, https://inflationcalculator.com/inflation/1963-to-2021/
APA: InflationCalculator.com. Inflation from 1963 to 2021. Based on U.S. Bureau of Labor Statistics CPI-U data. Retrieved from https://inflationcalculator.com/inflation/1963-to-2021/