$100 in 1969 is worth $626 in 2012,
because prices increased 525.6% over that period, an average of
4.36% a year.
$100 in 1969 has
the same buying power as
$626
in 2012
Detailed inflation statistics
Cumulative price change
525.6%
Average inflation rate
4.36% per year
Converted amount ($100 base)
$626
Price difference ($100 base)
$526
CPI in 1969
36.7
CPI in 2012
229.594
Inflation in 1969
5.46%
Inflation in 2012
2.07%
$100 in 1969 → 2012
$626
$100 in 2012 → 1969
$15.98
What happened to prices between 1969 and 2012
Between 1969 and 2012, the Consumer Price Index went from 36.7 to 229.594.
Cumulatively, prices increased 525.6%, which works out to an average of
4.36% per year. Put differently, a dollar in 1969 bought what
$0.16 buys in 2012: the 1969 dollar
lost 84.0% of its purchasing power over
these 43 years.
Consumer prices rose 5.5% in 1969, up from 1968’s 4.2% and
the fastest pace since the Korean War era, as years of Vietnam War
spending, a labor market with unemployment under 4%, and expansionary
fiscal policy finally showed up fully in prices. Richard Nixon was
inaugurated that January 20, pledging to curb rising prices without wage
and price controls, a position he would reverse within two years. The
decade’s most triumphant moment came that July 20, when Neil Armstrong
and Buzz Aldrin walked on the Moon while Michael Collins orbited above,
fulfilling the goal Kennedy had set in 1961 of landing a man on the lunar
surface before the decade’s end. Culture and protest both reached new
extremes that year: an estimated 400,000 people gathered on a dairy farm
in Bethel, New York, for the Woodstock music festival that August, and a
police raid on the Stonewall Inn in New York’s Greenwich Village that
June touched off days of resistance now credited with launching the
modern gay rights movement. Consumer prices finished the decade 270.7%
above their 1913 level, up 24.0% from where they stood in
1960. The 1960s had opened with inflation near 1% a year and closed with
prices rising faster than at any point since Korea, setting up the Great
Inflation that would define the
1970s. First-class postage held at 6 cents, and the minimum wage stayed
at $1.60 an hour.
Every 1969 amount converts to 2012 at the same ratio, 6.26: $1,000 becomes
$6,256, and $10,000 becomes $62,560.
Amount in 1969
Value in 2012
$1.00
$6.26
$5.00
$31.28
$10.00
$62.56
$20.00
$125
$50.00
$313
$100
$626
$500
$3,128
$1,000
$6,256
$5,000
$31,280
$10,000
$62,560
$100,000
$625,597
$1,000,000
$6,255,967
Inflation by spending category, 1969–2012
Between 1969 and 2012, medical care rose the most, up 1200.7%, while apparel rose the least, up 122.3%, against 525.6% for all items. The headline number is an average; here is what $100 of 1969
spending costs in 2012, by category:
Category
Avg. yearly inflation
$100 in 1969 →
All items (CPI-U)
4.36%
$626
Medical care
6.15%
$1,301
Energy
5.48%
$992
Housing
4.47%
$655
Food
4.37%
$630
Transportation
4.29%
$609
Core (all items less food & energy)
4.25%
$598
Apparel
1.88%
$222
Not shown because the BLS began these indexes after 1969: recreation (1993–), education & communication (1993–).
Decade by decade: 1969 to 2012
Prices climbed fastest in the 1970s, averaging 7.82% a year, and slowest in the 2000s (2.39% a year). Each step below chains into the full 1969–2012 change:
Years
Avg. yearly inflation
Price change
$100 from 1969, at end
1969–1970
5.72%
5.7%
$106
1970–1980
7.82%
112.4%
$225
1980–1990
4.72%
58.6%
$356
1990–2000
2.80%
31.8%
$469
2000–2010
2.39%
26.6%
$594
2010–2012
2.61%
5.3%
$626
Year by year: CPI and the value of $100 from 1969
$100 from 1969 had already become $371 by
1991, on its way to $626 in 2012; 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: 2012
In 2012, prices rose 2.1% and $100 from 1969 had the buying
power of $626; the year's average CPI of 229.594 is the level
behind every 2012 figure on this page.
2012 put a number on what the Federal Reserve was aiming for. In January the
Fed announced a 2% inflation target, and consumer prices rose 2.1% for the
year, almost exactly on it. Gasoline averaged $3.62 a gallon, another annual
high, but the pace of increase cooled from 2011’s 3.2% as food and core prices
grew more slowly.
The bigger story was housing and jobs. Home prices began to recover, and the
median new home sold for about $245,200, up from $227,200 the year before.
Median household income was $51,017. The federal minimum wage held at $7.25,
and a first-class stamp rose to 45 cents.
In September the Fed started a third round of asset purchases, this one with
no fixed end date, aimed at lowering unemployment. Overseas, the European
Central Bank’s July pledge to do “whatever it takes” to save the euro calmed
bond markets. A summer drought across the Midwest drove corn and soybean
prices to records, a shock that reached grocery shelves only partly, because
most of what shoppers pay for food covers processing and transport rather than
raw crops.
MLA: “Inflation from 1969 to 2012: $100 is worth $626 today.” InflationCalculator.com, U.S. Bureau of Labor Statistics CPI-U data, https://inflationcalculator.com/inflation/1969-to-2012/
APA: InflationCalculator.com. Inflation from 1969 to 2012. Based on U.S. Bureau of Labor Statistics CPI-U data. Retrieved from https://inflationcalculator.com/inflation/1969-to-2012/