$100 in 1978 is worth $227 in 1994,
because prices increased 127.3% over that period, an average of
5.27% a year.
$100 in 1978 has
the same buying power as
$227
in 1994
Detailed inflation statistics
Cumulative price change
127.3%
Average inflation rate
5.27% per year
Converted amount ($100 base)
$227
Price difference ($100 base)
$127
CPI in 1978
65.2
CPI in 1994
148.2
Inflation in 1978
7.59%
Inflation in 1994
2.56%
$100 in 1978 → 1994
$227
$100 in 1994 → 1978
$43.99
What happened to prices between 1978 and 1994
Between 1978 and 1994, the Consumer Price Index went from 65.2 to 148.2.
Cumulatively, prices increased 127.3%, which works out to an average of
5.27% per year. Put differently, a dollar in 1978 bought what
$0.44 buys in 1994: the 1978 dollar
lost 56.0% of its purchasing power over
these 16 years.
Consumer prices rose 7.6% in 1978, accelerating for a second straight year as
rising wages, a weakening dollar, and climbing energy costs outpaced the
Federal Reserve’s response. Fed chairman G. William Miller, appointed by
Carter that March, kept interest rates too low to slow the trend, a policy
later cited as one reason inflation kept building toward the following year’s
crisis. California voters responded to their own version of the problem that
June, passing Proposition 13 by nearly two to one to cap property tax rates
after years of rising home values had pushed tax bills up alongside them.
Foreign policy delivered one of the decade’s genuine breakthroughs: President
Carter brought Egyptian President Anwar Sadat and Israeli Prime Minister
Menachem Begin together for thirteen days of negotiations at Camp David that
September, producing a framework for peace between the two countries that was
signed as a treaty the following March. First-class postage rose to 15 cents
that May 29, a rate that would hold longer than any other in the decade. The
year ended in tragedy: cult leader Jim Jones directed the mass murder-suicide
of more than 900 followers at a remote settlement in Guyana that November 18.
A median household earned $15,064 in 1978, a new home sold for a median
$55,700, and gas averaged 63 cents a gallon. Consumer prices stood 558.6%
above their 1913 level, with the decade’s worst inflation
still to come.
Every 1978 amount converts to 1994 at the same ratio, 2.27: $1,000 becomes
$2,273, and $10,000 becomes $22,730.
Amount in 1978
Value in 1994
$1.00
$2.27
$5.00
$11.37
$10.00
$22.73
$20.00
$45.46
$50.00
$114
$100
$227
$500
$1,137
$1,000
$2,273
$5,000
$11,365
$10,000
$22,730
$100,000
$227,301
$1,000,000
$2,273,006
Inflation by spending category, 1978–1994
Between 1978 and 1994, medical care rose the most, up 241.4%, while apparel rose the least, up 63.9%, against 127.3% for all items. The headline number is an average; here is what $100 of 1978
spending costs in 1994, by category:
Category
Avg. yearly inflation
$100 in 1978 →
All items (CPI-U)
5.27%
$227
Medical care
7.98%
$341
Core (all items less food & energy)
5.59%
$239
Housing
5.40%
$232
Transportation
4.98%
$218
Food
4.44%
$200
Energy
4.40%
$199
Apparel
3.14%
$164
Not shown because the BLS began these indexes after 1978: recreation (1993–), education & communication (1993–).
Decade by decade: 1978 to 1994
Prices climbed fastest in the 1970s, averaging 12.42% a year, and slowest in the 1990s (3.19% a year). Each step below chains into the full 1978–1994 change:
Years
Avg. yearly inflation
Price change
$100 from 1978, at end
1978–1980
12.42%
26.4%
$126
1980–1990
4.72%
58.6%
$200
1990–1994
3.19%
13.4%
$227
Year by year: CPI and the value of $100 from 1978
$100 from 1978 had already become $168 by
1986, on its way to $227 in 1994; 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 1994, prices rose 2.6% and $100 from 1978 had the buying
power of $227; the year's average CPI of 148.2 is the level
behind every 1994 figure on this page.
Gas averaged $1.11 a gallon in 1994, a new home cost roughly $130,000, and the median household
earned about $32,300. Inflation ran at 2.6% for the year, the calmest reading since the
mid-1980s, even as the Federal Reserve spent the year raising interest rates precisely to keep
it that way. Chair Alan Greenspan’s Fed lifted the federal funds rate from 3% to 5.5% over six
moves, a preemptive tightening campaign meant to head off inflation before it built rather than
react to it after the fact. The bond market, unprepared for such a rapid climb, sold off
sharply, and the higher rates rippled into places few had expected: Orange County, California,
whose investment pool had bet heavily on rates staying low, filed for bankruptcy in December
after losing an estimated $1.7 billion, the largest municipal bankruptcy in the country’s
history at the time. On the trade front, NAFTA took effect January 1, phasing out tariffs on
thousands of goods moving between the U.S., Mexico, and Canada, the start of a schedule that
would eliminate most remaining barriers over the following decade. It was a year that showed
inflation control could have its own costs, paid out in the bond market and, in Orange County’s
case, a bankruptcy court.
MLA: “Inflation from 1978 to 1994: $100 is worth $227 today.” InflationCalculator.com, U.S. Bureau of Labor Statistics CPI-U data, https://inflationcalculator.com/inflation/1978-to-1994/
APA: InflationCalculator.com. Inflation from 1978 to 1994. Based on U.S. Bureau of Labor Statistics CPI-U data. Retrieved from https://inflationcalculator.com/inflation/1978-to-1994/