$100 in 1970 is worth $305 in 1988,
because prices increased 204.9% over that period, an average of
6.39% a year.
$100 in 1970 has
the same buying power as
$305
in 1988
Detailed inflation statistics
Cumulative price change
204.9%
Average inflation rate
6.39% per year
Converted amount ($100 base)
$305
Price difference ($100 base)
$205
CPI in 1970
38.8
CPI in 1988
118.3
Inflation in 1970
5.72%
Inflation in 1988
4.14%
$100 in 1970 → 1988
$305
$100 in 1988 → 1970
$32.80
What happened to prices between 1970 and 1988
Between 1970 and 1988, the Consumer Price Index went from 38.8 to 118.3.
Cumulatively, prices increased 204.9%, which works out to an average of
6.39% per year. Put differently, a dollar in 1970 bought what
$0.33 buys in 1988: the 1970 dollar
lost 67.2% of its purchasing power over
these 18 years.
Consumer prices rose 5.7% in 1970, up from 1969’s 5.5%, extending a
run of faster price growth that stretched back to the mid-1960s, even as a
recession that began in December 1969 pushed unemployment toward 6%. Prices
and joblessness rising together confounded the era’s economic thinking, which
held that policymakers could trade a little more inflation for a little less
unemployment; 1970 was an early sign that trade-off was breaking down, a
pattern that would harden into stagflation later in the decade. Washington
restructured how it delivered mail that year: after postal workers staged the
first strike ever by federal employees that March, Congress passed the Postal
Reorganization Act in August, replacing the cabinet-level Post Office
Department with the independent U.S. Postal Service. Environmental policy
also took shape in 1970. An estimated 20 million Americans marked the first
Earth Day on April 22, and the Environmental Protection Agency opened that
December to enforce the Clean Air Act and the pollution rules that followed.
The Vietnam War kept dividing the country: on May 4, National Guard troops
fired on antiwar demonstrators at Kent State University in Ohio, killing four
students and setting off strikes on hundreds of campuses. A median household
earned $8,734 that year, a gallon of gas averaged 36 cents, and a first-class
stamp cost 6 cents, the rate it had held since 1968. Prices stood 291.9%
above their 1913 level by the end of 1970, a milestone that
would look almost mild against the decade still to come.
Every 1970 amount converts to 1988 at the same ratio, 3.05: $1,000 becomes
$3,049, and $10,000 becomes $30,490.
Amount in 1970
Value in 1988
$1.00
$3.05
$5.00
$15.24
$10.00
$30.49
$20.00
$60.98
$50.00
$152
$100
$305
$500
$1,524
$1,000
$3,049
$5,000
$15,245
$10,000
$30,490
$100,000
$304,897
$1,000,000
$3,048,969
Inflation by spending category, 1970–1988
Between 1970 and 1988, medical care rose the most, up 307.6%, while apparel rose the least, up 94.9%, against 204.9% for all items. The headline number is an average; here is what $100 of 1970
spending costs in 1988, by category:
Category
Avg. yearly inflation
$100 in 1970 →
All items (CPI-U)
6.39%
$305
Medical care
8.12%
$408
Energy
7.21%
$350
Housing
6.78%
$326
Core (all items less food & energy)
6.34%
$302
Food
6.32%
$302
Transportation
6.09%
$290
Apparel
3.78%
$195
Not shown because the BLS began these indexes after 1970: recreation (1993–), education & communication (1993–).
Decade by decade: 1970 to 1988
Prices climbed fastest in the 1970s, averaging 7.82% a year, and slowest in the 1980s (4.62% a year). Each step below chains into the full 1970–1988 change:
Years
Avg. yearly inflation
Price change
$100 from 1970, at end
1970–1980
7.82%
112.4%
$212
1980–1988
4.62%
43.6%
$305
Year by year: CPI and the value of $100 from 1970
$100 from 1970 had already become $187 by
1979, on its way to $305 in 1988; 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 1.9% in 1986.
In 1988, prices rose 4.1% and $100 from 1970 had the buying
power of $305; the year's average CPI of 118.3 is the level
behind every 1988 figure on this page.
By 1988, the economic expansion that began in the ashes of the 1981-82
recession was in its sixth year, and the Federal Reserve was watching for
signs it had run too long. Inflation rose to 4.1%, up from 3.6% the year
before, while unemployment fell to its lowest level since 1974. Alan
Greenspan’s Fed responded by raising the federal funds rate through the
year, from about 6.5% to 8.5%, trying to cool demand before prices
accelerated the way they had in the 1970s. Households still felt the
difference between this expansion and the last one: gas held near 90 cents
a gallon, almost exactly its 1987 price, and median household income rose
to roughly $27,200. The one price that moved was postage, which rose from
22 to 25 cents in April, the fourth increase of the decade but a far
gentler pace than the string of increases in the late 1970s and early
1980s. In November, Vice President George H.W. Bush won the presidency on
the strength of the expansion, promising in his nomination speech to hold
the line on taxes. Both the boom and that pledge would run into trouble
within two years, as the Fed’s rate increases helped tip the economy toward
the 1990-91 recession.
MLA: “Inflation from 1970 to 1988: $100 is worth $305 today.” InflationCalculator.com, U.S. Bureau of Labor Statistics CPI-U data, https://inflationcalculator.com/inflation/1970-to-1988/
APA: InflationCalculator.com. Inflation from 1970 to 1988. Based on U.S. Bureau of Labor Statistics CPI-U data. Retrieved from https://inflationcalculator.com/inflation/1970-to-1988/