$100 in 1968 is worth $735 in 2019,
because prices increased 634.6% over that period, an average of
3.99% a year.
$100 in 1968 has
the same buying power as
$735
in 2019
Detailed inflation statistics
Cumulative price change
634.6%
Average inflation rate
3.99% per year
Converted amount ($100 base)
$735
Price difference ($100 base)
$635
CPI in 1968
34.8
CPI in 2019
255.657
Inflation in 1968
4.19%
Inflation in 2019
1.81%
$100 in 1968 → 2019
$735
$100 in 2019 → 1968
$13.61
What happened to prices between 1968 and 2019
Between 1968 and 2019, the Consumer Price Index went from 34.8 to 255.657.
Cumulatively, prices increased 634.6%, which works out to an average of
3.99% per year. Put differently, a dollar in 1968 bought what
$0.14 buys in 2019: the 1968 dollar
lost 86.4% of its purchasing power over
these 51 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 2019 at the same ratio, 7.35: $1,000 becomes
$7,346, and $10,000 becomes $73,465.
Amount in 1968
Value in 2019
$1.00
$7.35
$5.00
$36.73
$10.00
$73.46
$20.00
$147
$50.00
$367
$100
$735
$500
$3,673
$1,000
$7,346
$5,000
$36,732
$10,000
$73,465
$100,000
$734,647
$1,000,000
$7,346,466
Inflation by spending category, 1968–2019
Between 1968 and 2019, medical care rose the most, up 1566.9%, while apparel rose the least, up 131.0%, against 634.6% for all items. The headline number is an average; here is what $100 of 1968
spending costs in 2019, by category:
Category
Avg. yearly inflation
$100 in 1968 →
All items (CPI-U)
3.99%
$735
Medical care
5.67%
$1,667
Energy
4.38%
$890
Housing
4.24%
$831
Food
3.98%
$732
Core (all items less food & energy)
3.96%
$725
Transportation
3.62%
$612
Apparel
1.66%
$231
Not shown because the BLS began these indexes after 1968: recreation (1993–), education & communication (1993–).
Decade by decade: 1968 to 2019
Prices climbed fastest in the 1970s, averaging 7.82% a year, and slowest in the 2010s (1.78% a year). Each step below chains into the full 1968–2019 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
2010–2019
1.78%
17.2%
$735
Year by year: CPI and the value of $100 from 1968
$100 from 1968 had already become $426 by
1994, on its way to $735 in 2019; 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: 2019
In 2019, prices rose 1.8% and $100 from 1968 had the buying
power of $735; the year's average CPI of 255.657 is the level
behind every 2019 figure on this page.
2019 was the last ordinary year before COVID-19. Consumer prices rose 1.8%,
slightly under the Federal Reserve’s 2% target, with gasoline averaging
$2.60 a gallon. Median household income jumped to $68,703, the highest on
record up to that point, and the median new home sold for about $328,000. A
first-class stamp rose to 55 cents.
The Fed reversed course. After four increases in 2018, it cut rates three
times, to 1.50–1.75%, citing slower global growth, trade tensions, and low
inflation. In July the expansion that began in June 2009 became the longest in
U.S. records, and in August the yield curve briefly inverted, a signal
investors read as a recession warning.
For workers at the bottom of the pay scale, 2019 marked a milestone of a
different kind. The federal minimum wage stayed at $7.25 and reached its tenth
year without an increase, the longest gap since the wage was first set. Because
prices had climbed about 19% since it was last raised in 2009, its buying power
was lower than at any point in that span.
MLA: “Inflation from 1968 to 2019: $100 is worth $735 today.” InflationCalculator.com, U.S. Bureau of Labor Statistics CPI-U data, https://inflationcalculator.com/inflation/1968-to-2019/
APA: InflationCalculator.com. Inflation from 1968 to 2019. Based on U.S. Bureau of Labor Statistics CPI-U data. Retrieved from https://inflationcalculator.com/inflation/1968-to-2019/