$100 in 1965 is worth $640 in 2006,
because prices increased 540.0% over that period, an average of
4.63% a year.
$100 in 1965 has
the same buying power as
$640
in 2006
Detailed inflation statistics
Cumulative price change
540.0%
Average inflation rate
4.63% per year
Converted amount ($100 base)
$640
Price difference ($100 base)
$540
CPI in 1965
31.5
CPI in 2006
201.6
Inflation in 1965
1.61%
Inflation in 2006
3.23%
$100 in 1965 → 2006
$640
$100 in 2006 → 1965
$15.63
What happened to prices between 1965 and 2006
Between 1965 and 2006, the Consumer Price Index went from 31.5 to 201.6.
Cumulatively, prices increased 540.0%, which works out to an average of
4.63% per year. Put differently, a dollar in 1965 bought what
$0.16 buys in 2006: the 1965 dollar
lost 84.4% of its purchasing power over
these 41 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 2006 at the same ratio, 6.40: $1,000 becomes
$6,400, and $10,000 becomes $64,000.
Amount in 1965
Value in 2006
$1.00
$6.40
$5.00
$32.00
$10.00
$64.00
$20.00
$128
$50.00
$320
$100
$640
$500
$3,200
$1,000
$6,400
$5,000
$32,000
$10,000
$64,000
$100,000
$640,000
$1,000,000
$6,400,000
Inflation by spending category, 1965–2006
Between 1965 and 2006, medical care rose the most, up 1234.1%, while apparel rose the least, up 150.0%, against 540.0% for all items. The headline number is an average; here is what $100 of 1965
spending costs in 2006, by category:
Category
Avg. yearly inflation
$100 in 1965 →
All items (CPI-U)
4.63%
$640
Medical care
6.52%
$1,334
Energy
5.39%
$860
Core (all items less food & energy)
4.59%
$630
Food
4.49%
$606
Transportation
4.32%
$567
Apparel
2.26%
$250
Not shown because the BLS began these indexes after 1965: housing (1967–), recreation (1993–), education & communication (1993–).
Decade by decade: 1965 to 2006
Prices climbed fastest in the 1970s, averaging 7.82% a year, and slowest in the 2000s (2.66% a year). Each step below chains into the full 1965–2006 change:
Years
Avg. yearly inflation
Price change
$100 from 1965, at end
1965–1970
4.26%
23.2%
$123
1970–1980
7.82%
112.4%
$262
1980–1990
4.72%
58.6%
$415
1990–2000
2.80%
31.8%
$547
2000–2006
2.66%
17.1%
$640
Year by year: CPI and the value of $100 from 1965
$100 from 1965 had already become $342 by
1985, on its way to $640 in 2006; 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 1.6% in 1998.
Long periods are sampled every 2 years; the calculator above covers any pair of years.
The destination year: 2006
In 2006, prices rose 3.2% and $100 from 1965 had the buying
power of $640; the year's average CPI of 201.6 is the level
behind every 2006 figure on this page.
Inflation was 3.2% in 2006 and gasoline averaged $2.59 a gallon, up 29 cents from 2005. The
median household earned about $48,200 and the median new home cost $246,500, a gain of about
2% after a 13% jump in 2004 and 9% in 2005. National home prices, by the S&P/Case-Shiller
index, peaked in mid-2006. Ben Bernanke replaced Alan Greenspan as Federal Reserve chair on
February 1, and on June 29 the Fed raised its policy rate to 5.25%, the last of 17 straight
quarter-point increases. It held there for over a year. A first-class stamp rose to 39 cents in
January, and the federal minimum wage was $5.15 for the ninth full year in a row.
MLA: “Inflation from 1965 to 2006: $100 is worth $640 today.” InflationCalculator.com, U.S. Bureau of Labor Statistics CPI-U data, https://inflationcalculator.com/inflation/1965-to-2006/
APA: InflationCalculator.com. Inflation from 1965 to 2006. Based on U.S. Bureau of Labor Statistics CPI-U data. Retrieved from https://inflationcalculator.com/inflation/1965-to-2006/