$100 in 1975 is worth $135 in 1979,
because prices increased 34.9% over that period, an average of
7.78% a year.
$100 in 1975 has
the same buying power as
$135
in 1979
Detailed inflation statistics
Cumulative price change
34.9%
Average inflation rate
7.78% per year
Converted amount ($100 base)
$135
Price difference ($100 base)
$34.94
CPI in 1975
53.8
CPI in 1979
72.6
Inflation in 1975
9.13%
Inflation in 1979
11.35%
$100 in 1975 → 1979
$135
$100 in 1979 → 1975
$74.10
What happened to prices between 1975 and 1979
Between 1975 and 1979, the Consumer Price Index went from 53.8 to 72.6.
Cumulatively, prices increased 34.9%, which works out to an average of
7.78% per year. Put differently, a dollar in 1975 bought what
$0.74 buys in 1979: the 1975 dollar
lost 25.9% of its purchasing power over
these 4 years.
Consumer prices rose 9.1% in 1975, easing slightly from 1974’s
11.0% but still running far above anything the country had experienced before
the decade began. The recession that started in November 1973, the deepest
since the Great Depression, bottomed out that March, yet unemployment kept
climbing through the year and touched 9%, a combination of high inflation and
high joblessness that had no precedent in the postwar data. Vietnam ended
that April 30, when North Vietnamese forces captured Saigon and the last
Americans were evacuated by helicopter from the U.S. embassy roof. Fiscal
strain hit closer to home too: New York City, facing bankruptcy after years
of borrowing to paper over budget gaps, asked Washington for help that
October. President Ford’s initial refusal produced the Daily News headline
“Ford to City: Drop Dead,” though he ultimately signed a federal loan package
that December. Amid the gloom, Bill Gates and Paul Allen founded Microsoft
that April in Albuquerque, New Mexico, to sell a version of the BASIC
programming language for the Altair 8800, one of the first personal
computers sold to hobbyists. A median household earned $11,800 in 1975, a new
home sold for a median $39,300, and first-class postage held at 10 cents,
unchanged since 1974’s increase. Consumer prices stood 443.4%
above their 1913 level, with the decade barely past its
midpoint.
Every 1975 amount converts to 1979 at the same ratio, 1.35: $1,000 becomes
$1,349, and $10,000 becomes $13,494.
Amount in 1975
Value in 1979
$1.00
$1.35
$5.00
$6.75
$10.00
$13.49
$20.00
$26.99
$50.00
$67.47
$100
$135
$500
$675
$1,000
$1,349
$5,000
$6,747
$10,000
$13,494
$100,000
$134,944
$1,000,000
$1,349,442
Inflation by spending category, 1975–1979
Between 1975 and 1979, energy rose the most, up 56.1%, while apparel rose the least, up 17.1%, against 34.9% for all items. The headline number is an average; here is what $100 of 1975
spending costs in 1979, by category:
Category
Avg. yearly inflation
$100 in 1975 →
All items (CPI-U)
7.78%
$135
Energy
11.77%
$156
Medical care
9.18%
$142
Transportation
8.92%
$141
Housing
8.44%
$138
Food
7.51%
$134
Core (all items less food & energy)
7.47%
$133
Apparel
4.03%
$117
Not shown because the BLS began these indexes after 1975: recreation (1993–), education & communication (1993–).
Year by year: CPI and the value of $100 from 1975
$100 from 1975 had already become $113 by
1977, on its way to $135 in 1979; each row shows the CPI, that
year's inflation rate, and the running value.
Within the span, inflation peaked at 11.3% in 1979, and the smallest rise was 5.8% in 1976.
In 1979, prices rose 11.3% and $100 from 1975 had the buying
power of $135; the year's average CPI of 72.6 is the level
behind every 1979 figure on this page.
Consumer prices rose 11.3% in 1979, the fastest pace since 1947 and the
decade’s second bout of double-digit inflation after 1974’s
11.0%. The trigger was familiar: the Iranian Revolution that January halted
Iran’s oil exports, and panic buying amplified the shortage, sending crude
prices sharply higher over the year and motorists back into gas lines, with
some states reviving the odd-even rationing last seen in 1974. Paul Volcker,
appointed Federal Reserve chairman that August, responded with a strategy
shift announced that October: the Fed would target the money supply directly
and let interest rates rise as high as necessary to break inflation, whatever
the short-term cost. That cost would arrive as a deep recession in 1981-82,
but by year’s end 1979 had already delivered enough turmoil on its own. A
reactor at the Three Mile Island plant near Harrisburg, Pennsylvania,
suffered a partial core meltdown that March 28, the worst commercial nuclear
accident in U.S. history, and on November 4, militants in Tehran stormed the
U.S. embassy and took 52 Americans hostage, beginning a 444-day crisis that
consumed the rest of Carter’s presidency. A median household earned $16,461
in 1979, a new home sold for a median $62,900, and gas jumped to 86 cents a
gallon. Consumer prices finished the decade 97.8% above where they stood in
1969, very nearly doubling in ten years, and stood 633.3%
above their 1913 level. The 1970s had opened with inflation
cooling from the 1969 spike and closed with prices rising faster than at any
point since 1947, setting up the Great
Inflation’s final act in 1980.
MLA: “Inflation from 1975 to 1979: $100 is worth $135 today.” InflationCalculator.com, U.S. Bureau of Labor Statistics CPI-U data, https://inflationcalculator.com/inflation/1975-to-1979/
APA: InflationCalculator.com. Inflation from 1975 to 1979. Based on U.S. Bureau of Labor Statistics CPI-U data. Retrieved from https://inflationcalculator.com/inflation/1975-to-1979/