$100 in 1965 is worth $230 in 1979,
because prices increased 130.5% over that period, an average of
6.15% a year.
$100 in 1965 has
the same buying power as
$230
in 1979
Detailed inflation statistics
Cumulative price change
130.5%
Average inflation rate
6.15% per year
Converted amount ($100 base)
$230
Price difference ($100 base)
$130
CPI in 1965
31.5
CPI in 1979
72.6
Inflation in 1965
1.61%
Inflation in 1979
11.35%
$100 in 1965 → 1979
$230
$100 in 1979 → 1965
$43.39
What happened to prices between 1965 and 1979
Between 1965 and 1979, the Consumer Price Index went from 31.5 to 72.6.
Cumulatively, prices increased 130.5%, which works out to an average of
6.15% per year. Put differently, a dollar in 1965 bought what
$0.43 buys in 1979: the 1965 dollar
lost 56.6% of its purchasing power over
these 14 years.
Consumer prices rose 1.6% in 1965, up from 1964’s 1.3% in a
pickup that economists later mark as the start of the Great
Inflation, a run of accelerating
price increases driven by rising Vietnam War spending layered on top of
new Great Society programs. The war itself escalated on the ground that
March, when about 3,500 Marines came ashore at Da Nang, the first American
combat troops committed to Vietnam; troop levels would climb toward
200,000 by year’s end. Domestic policy expanded just as fast: Medicare and
Medicaid became law that July 30, creating federal health insurance for
older and low-income Americans, and the Voting Rights Act, signed that
August 6, banned literacy tests and other devices used to disenfranchise
Black voters. The civil rights movement’s gains coexisted with urban
unrest that same August, when a highway patrol traffic stop in the Watts
neighborhood of Los Angeles set off six days of rioting that left 34
people dead. Consumer prices finished 1965 218.2% above their
1913 level. First-class postage held at 5 cents, and the
minimum wage stayed at $1.25 an hour.
Every 1965 amount converts to 1979 at the same ratio, 2.30: $1,000 becomes
$2,305, and $10,000 becomes $23,048.
Amount in 1965
Value in 1979
$1.00
$2.30
$5.00
$11.52
$10.00
$23.05
$20.00
$46.10
$50.00
$115
$100
$230
$500
$1,152
$1,000
$2,305
$5,000
$11,524
$10,000
$23,048
$100,000
$230,476
$1,000,000
$2,304,762
Inflation by spending category, 1965–1979
Between 1965 and 1979, energy rose the most, up 186.9%, while apparel rose the least, up 77.6%, against 130.5% for all items. The headline number is an average; here is what $100 of 1965
spending costs in 1979, by category:
Category
Avg. yearly inflation
$100 in 1965 →
All items (CPI-U)
6.15%
$230
Energy
7.82%
$287
Medical care
7.29%
$268
Food
6.71%
$248
Transportation
5.83%
$221
Core (all items less food & energy)
5.79%
$220
Apparel
4.19%
$178
Not shown because the BLS began these indexes after 1965: housing (1967–), recreation (1993–), education & communication (1993–).
Decade by decade: 1965 to 1979
Prices climbed fastest in the 1970s, averaging 7.21% a year, and slowest in the 1960s (4.26% a year). Each step below chains into the full 1965–1979 change:
Years
Avg. yearly inflation
Price change
$100 from 1965, at end
1965–1970
4.26%
23.2%
$123
1970–1979
7.21%
87.1%
$230
Year by year: CPI and the value of $100 from 1965
$100 from 1965 had already become $133 by
1972, on its way to $230 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 2.9% in 1966.
In 1979, prices rose 11.3% and $100 from 1965 had the buying
power of $230; 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 1965 to 1979: $100 is worth $230 today.” InflationCalculator.com, U.S. Bureau of Labor Statistics CPI-U data, https://inflationcalculator.com/inflation/1965-to-1979/
APA: InflationCalculator.com. Inflation from 1965 to 1979. Based on U.S. Bureau of Labor Statistics CPI-U data. Retrieved from https://inflationcalculator.com/inflation/1965-to-1979/