$100 in 1972 is worth $700 in 2022,
because prices increased 600.1% over that period, an average of
3.97% a year.
$100 in 1972 has
the same buying power as
$700
in 2022
Detailed inflation statistics
Cumulative price change
600.1%
Average inflation rate
3.97% per year
Converted amount ($100 base)
$700
Price difference ($100 base)
$600
CPI in 1972
41.8
CPI in 2022
292.655
Inflation in 1972
3.21%
Inflation in 2022
8.00%
$100 in 1972 → 2022
$700
$100 in 2022 → 1972
$14.28
What happened to prices between 1972 and 2022
Between 1972 and 2022, the Consumer Price Index went from 41.8 to 292.655.
Cumulatively, prices increased 600.1%, which works out to an average of
3.97% per year. Put differently, a dollar in 1972 bought what
$0.14 buys in 2022: the 1972 dollar
lost 85.7% of its purchasing power over
these 50 years.
Consumer prices rose just 3.2% in 1972, the calmest year of the decade and a
sharp break from the previous two years. The relief was largely engineered:
Nixon’s wage and price controls, imposed as a 90-day freeze in August 1971,
had settled into a series of “phases” that capped how much businesses could
raise prices through the election year. Economists would later argue the
controls mostly deferred inflation rather than curing it, storing up pressure
that broke loose once they were lifted. Nixon spent political capital on
foreign policy that year, traveling to Beijing that February in the first
visit by a sitting U.S. president to the People’s Republic of China, a trip
that began normalizing relations Washington had frozen since 1949. Closer to
home, five men were arrested breaking into the Democratic National
Committee’s offices at the Watergate complex that June 17, an event that drew
little attention at the time but would eventually force Nixon from office.
None of it dented his re-election bid: Nixon carried 49 states against
Democrat George McGovern that November, helped by an economy that, on paper,
looked more stable than it had in years. A median household earned $9,697 in
1972, a new home sold for a median $27,600, and gas held near 36 cents a
gallon for a third straight year. Consumer prices stood 322.2% above their
1913 level, a lull that would not survive contact with the
controls’ expiration and the oil shock still to come.
Every 1972 amount converts to 2022 at the same ratio, 7.00: $1,000 becomes
$7,001, and $10,000 becomes $70,013.
Amount in 1972
Value in 2022
$1.00
$7.00
$5.00
$35.01
$10.00
$70.01
$20.00
$140
$50.00
$350
$100
$700
$500
$3,501
$1,000
$7,001
$5,000
$35,007
$10,000
$70,013
$100,000
$700,132
$1,000,000
$7,001,316
Inflation by spending category, 1972–2022
Between 1972 and 2022, medical care rose the most, up 1365.3%, while apparel rose the least, up 104.0%, against 600.1% for all items. The headline number is an average; here is what $100 of 1972
spending costs in 2022, by category:
Category
Avg. yearly inflation
$100 in 1972 →
All items (CPI-U)
3.97%
$700
Medical care
5.52%
$1,465
Energy
4.91%
$1,097
Housing
4.15%
$763
Food
4.04%
$725
Core (all items less food & energy)
3.87%
$669
Transportation
3.87%
$667
Apparel
1.44%
$204
Not shown because the BLS began these indexes after 1972: recreation (1993–), education & communication (1993–).
Decade by decade: 1972 to 2022
Prices climbed fastest in the 1970s, averaging 8.85% a year, and slowest in the 2010s (1.73% a year). Each step below chains into the full 1972–2022 change:
Years
Avg. yearly inflation
Price change
$100 from 1972, at end
1972–1980
8.85%
97.1%
$197
1980–1990
4.72%
58.6%
$313
1990–2000
2.80%
31.8%
$412
2000–2010
2.39%
26.6%
$522
2010–2020
1.73%
18.7%
$619
2020–2022
6.34%
13.1%
$700
Year by year: CPI and the value of $100 from 1972
$100 from 1972 had already become $375 by
1996, on its way to $700 in 2022; 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: 2022
In 2022, prices rose 8.0% and $100 from 1972 had the buying
power of $700; the year's average CPI of 292.655 is the level
behind every 2022 figure on this page.
2022 was the year inflation returned. Consumer prices rose 8.0% on average,
the worst since 1981, driven by pandemic-era supply chains, stimulus-fueled
demand, and an energy shock from the war in Ukraine. Gas briefly topped $5 a
gallon nationally for the first time ever, and “inflation” became the
top-ranked economic concern in nearly every poll of American households.
MLA: “Inflation from 1972 to 2022: $100 is worth $700 today.” InflationCalculator.com, U.S. Bureau of Labor Statistics CPI-U data, https://inflationcalculator.com/inflation/1972-to-2022/
APA: InflationCalculator.com. Inflation from 1972 to 2022. Based on U.S. Bureau of Labor Statistics CPI-U data. Retrieved from https://inflationcalculator.com/inflation/1972-to-2022/