$100 in 1968 is worth $681 in 2015,
because prices increased 581.1% over that period, an average of
4.17% a year.
$100 in 1968 has
the same buying power as
$681
in 2015
Detailed inflation statistics
Cumulative price change
581.1%
Average inflation rate
4.17% per year
Converted amount ($100 base)
$681
Price difference ($100 base)
$581
CPI in 1968
34.8
CPI in 2015
237.017
Inflation in 1968
4.19%
Inflation in 2015
0.12%
$100 in 1968 → 2015
$681
$100 in 2015 → 1968
$14.68
What happened to prices between 1968 and 2015
Between 1968 and 2015, the Consumer Price Index went from 34.8 to 237.017.
Cumulatively, prices increased 581.1%, which works out to an average of
4.17% per year. Put differently, a dollar in 1968 bought what
$0.15 buys in 2015: the 1968 dollar
lost 85.3% of its purchasing power over
these 47 years.
Consumer prices rose 4.2% in 1968, up sharply from 1967’s
3.1% and the fastest pace in 17 years, as Vietnam War spending and a tight
labor market pushed inflation higher despite the Federal Reserve’s
earlier tightening. The year was marked by political violence: Martin
Luther King Jr. was assassinated on a motel balcony in Memphis on April
4, touching off rioting in more than 100 cities, and Robert F. Kennedy was
shot in Los Angeles on June 5, moments after winning California’s
Democratic presidential primary, and died the next day. Washington tried
to answer the inflation problem directly that June 28, when Congress
passed a 10% income tax surcharge, the Revenue and Expenditure Control
Act, temporarily raising taxes and cutting spending to cool an economy
overheated by war and Great Society outlays; prices kept accelerating
anyway. The cost of living rose in smaller, more visible ways too:
first-class postage climbed to 6 cents that January 7, and the minimum
wage rose to $1.60 an hour that February 1, the final step of the
increase Congress had set two years earlier. Consumer prices finished
1968 251.5% above their 1913 level.
Every 1968 amount converts to 2015 at the same ratio, 6.81: $1,000 becomes
$6,811, and $10,000 becomes $68,108.
Amount in 1968
Value in 2015
$1.00
$6.81
$5.00
$34.05
$10.00
$68.11
$20.00
$136
$50.00
$341
$100
$681
$500
$3,405
$1,000
$6,811
$5,000
$34,054
$10,000
$68,108
$100,000
$681,083
$1,000,000
$6,810,833
Inflation by spending category, 1968–2015
Between 1968 and 2015, medical care rose the most, up 1394.2%, while apparel rose the least, up 134.5%, against 581.1% for all items. The headline number is an average; here is what $100 of 1968
spending costs in 2015, by category:
Category
Avg. yearly inflation
$100 in 1968 →
All items (CPI-U)
4.17%
$681
Medical care
5.92%
$1,494
Energy
4.63%
$838
Housing
4.36%
$744
Food
4.23%
$700
Core (all items less food & energy)
4.12%
$667
Transportation
3.81%
$580
Apparel
1.83%
$234
Not shown because the BLS began these indexes after 1968: recreation (1993–), education & communication (1993–).
Decade by decade: 1968 to 2015
Prices climbed fastest in the 1970s, averaging 7.82% a year, and slowest in the 2010s (1.68% a year). Each step below chains into the full 1968–2015 change:
Years
Avg. yearly inflation
Price change
$100 from 1968, at end
1968–1970
5.59%
11.5%
$111
1970–1980
7.82%
112.4%
$237
1980–1990
4.72%
58.6%
$376
1990–2000
2.80%
31.8%
$495
2000–2010
2.39%
26.6%
$627
2010–2015
1.68%
8.7%
$681
Year by year: CPI and the value of $100 from 1968
$100 from 1968 had already become $403 by
1992, on its way to $681 in 2015; 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: 2015
In 2015, prices rose 0.1% and $100 from 1968 had the buying
power of $681; the year's average CPI of 237.017 is the level
behind every 2015 figure on this page.
2015 was almost a year with no inflation at all. Consumer prices rose 0.1%,
the smallest increase since the 2009 decline, because energy prices kept
falling. Gasoline averaged $2.45 a gallon, down from $3.37 in 2014, and a
strong dollar made imported goods cheaper. The picture was different outside
food and energy: core prices rose about 1.8% as rents and medical costs
climbed.
Incomes finally showed real progress. Median household income reached $56,516,
a large jump from $53,657, and the median new home sold for about $296,400. The
federal minimum wage stayed at $7.25, and a first-class stamp stayed at 49
cents.
The Federal Reserve chose December to end its zero-rate policy, raising the
target range to 0.25–0.50% for the first time since 2006. It moved even
though headline inflation was far under 2%, arguing that the drag from
energy was temporary. Earlier, a currency shift in China in August had shaken
global markets and pushed oil below $40 a barrel. Prices in 2015 ended
the year barely above their 2014 level.
MLA: “Inflation from 1968 to 2015: $100 is worth $681 today.” InflationCalculator.com, U.S. Bureau of Labor Statistics CPI-U data, https://inflationcalculator.com/inflation/1968-to-2015/
APA: InflationCalculator.com. Inflation from 1968 to 2015. Based on U.S. Bureau of Labor Statistics CPI-U data. Retrieved from https://inflationcalculator.com/inflation/1968-to-2015/