$100 in 1978 is worth $449 in 2022,
because prices increased 348.9% over that period, an average of
3.47% a year.
$100 in 1978 has
the same buying power as
$449
in 2022
Detailed inflation statistics
Cumulative price change
348.9%
Average inflation rate
3.47% per year
Converted amount ($100 base)
$449
Price difference ($100 base)
$349
CPI in 1978
65.2
CPI in 2022
292.655
Inflation in 1978
7.59%
Inflation in 2022
8.00%
$100 in 1978 → 2022
$449
$100 in 2022 → 1978
$22.28
What happened to prices between 1978 and 2022
Between 1978 and 2022, the Consumer Price Index went from 65.2 to 292.655.
Cumulatively, prices increased 348.9%, which works out to an average of
3.47% per year. Put differently, a dollar in 1978 bought what
$0.22 buys in 2022: the 1978 dollar
lost 77.7% of its purchasing power over
these 44 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 2022 at the same ratio, 4.49: $1,000 becomes
$4,489, and $10,000 becomes $44,886.
Amount in 1978
Value in 2022
$1.00
$4.49
$5.00
$22.44
$10.00
$44.89
$20.00
$89.77
$50.00
$224
$100
$449
$500
$2,244
$1,000
$4,489
$5,000
$22,443
$10,000
$44,886
$100,000
$448,857
$1,000,000
$4,488,574
Inflation by spending category, 1978–2022
Between 1978 and 2022, medical care rose the most, up 784.4%, while apparel rose the least, up 56.1%, against 348.9% for all items. The headline number is an average; here is what $100 of 1978
spending costs in 2022, by category:
Category
Avg. yearly inflation
$100 in 1978 →
All items (CPI-U)
3.47%
$449
Medical care
5.08%
$884
Energy
4.03%
$568
Housing
3.64%
$482
Core (all items less food & energy)
3.47%
$449
Transportation
3.38%
$432
Food
3.34%
$424
Apparel
1.02%
$156
Not shown because the BLS began these indexes after 1978: recreation (1993–), education & communication (1993–).
Decade by decade: 1978 to 2022
Prices climbed fastest in the 1970s, averaging 12.42% a year, and slowest in the 2010s (1.73% a year). Each step below chains into the full 1978–2022 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
1990–2000
2.80%
31.8%
$264
2000–2010
2.39%
26.6%
$334
2010–2020
1.73%
18.7%
$397
2020–2022
6.34%
13.1%
$449
Year by year: CPI and the value of $100 from 1978
$100 from 1978 had already become $264 by
2000, on its way to $449 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 1978 had the buying
power of $449; 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 1978 to 2022: $100 is worth $449 today.” InflationCalculator.com, U.S. Bureau of Labor Statistics CPI-U data, https://inflationcalculator.com/inflation/1978-to-2022/
APA: InflationCalculator.com. Inflation from 1978 to 2022. Based on U.S. Bureau of Labor Statistics CPI-U data. Retrieved from https://inflationcalculator.com/inflation/1978-to-2022/