$100 in 1979 is worth $310 in 2011,
because prices increased 209.8% over that period, an average of
3.60% a year.
$100 in 1979 has
the same buying power as
$310
in 2011
Detailed inflation statistics
Cumulative price change
209.8%
Average inflation rate
3.60% per year
Converted amount ($100 base)
$310
Price difference ($100 base)
$210
CPI in 1979
72.6
CPI in 2011
224.939
Inflation in 1979
11.35%
Inflation in 2011
3.16%
$100 in 1979 → 2011
$310
$100 in 2011 → 1979
$32.28
What happened to prices between 1979 and 2011
Between 1979 and 2011, the Consumer Price Index went from 72.6 to 224.939.
Cumulatively, prices increased 209.8%, which works out to an average of
3.60% per year. Put differently, a dollar in 1979 bought what
$0.32 buys in 2011: the 1979 dollar
lost 67.7% of its purchasing power over
these 32 years.
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.
Every 1979 amount converts to 2011 at the same ratio, 3.10: $1,000 becomes
$3,098, and $10,000 becomes $30,983.
Amount in 1979
Value in 2011
$1.00
$3.10
$5.00
$15.49
$10.00
$30.98
$20.00
$61.97
$50.00
$155
$100
$310
$500
$1,549
$1,000
$3,098
$5,000
$15,492
$10,000
$30,983
$100,000
$309,833
$1,000,000
$3,098,333
Inflation by spending category, 1979–2011
Between 1979 and 2011, medical care rose the most, up 493.0%, while apparel rose the least, up 43.8%, against 209.8% for all items. The headline number is an average; here is what $100 of 1979
spending costs in 2011, by category:
Category
Avg. yearly inflation
$100 in 1979 →
All items (CPI-U)
3.60%
$310
Medical care
5.72%
$593
Energy
4.18%
$371
Core (all items less food & energy)
3.63%
$313
Housing
3.63%
$313
Transportation
3.51%
$301
Food
3.33%
$285
Apparel
1.14%
$144
Not shown because the BLS began these indexes after 1979: recreation (1993–), education & communication (1993–).
Decade by decade: 1979 to 2011
Prices climbed fastest in the 1970s, averaging 13.50% a year, and slowest in the 2000s (2.39% a year). Each step below chains into the full 1979–2011 change:
Years
Avg. yearly inflation
Price change
$100 from 1979, at end
1979–1980
13.50%
13.5%
$113
1980–1990
4.72%
58.6%
$180
1990–2000
2.80%
31.8%
$237
2000–2010
2.39%
26.6%
$300
2010–2011
3.16%
3.2%
$310
Year by year: CPI and the value of $100 from 1979
$100 from 1979 had already become $210 by
1995, on its way to $310 in 2011; 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: 2011
In 2011, prices rose 3.2% and $100 from 1979 had the buying
power of $310; the year's average CPI of 224.939 is the level
behind every 2011 figure on this page.
2011 brought the fastest inflation of the post-recession recovery. Consumer
prices rose 3.2%, roughly double the 2010 pace, and the cause was mostly at the
pump and the grocery store. Unrest across the Middle East and North Africa,
including the war in Libya, pushed gasoline to an annual average of $3.52 a
gallon, the highest yearly figure recorded to that point. Food prices also
rose faster than the overall index.
Household budgets did not keep up. The median household income was $50,054,
barely above the year before, and the median new home sold for about $227,200.
The federal minimum wage stayed at $7.25 and a first-class stamp at 44 cents.
Policy stayed loose. The Federal Reserve kept its policy rate near zero and
launched Operation Twist in September to lower long-term rates. Washington
spent the summer in a debt-ceiling fight that ended in S&P’s August downgrade
of the U.S. credit rating. The inflation spike proved temporary: the
2011 rate was the high point of the early 2010s, and prices grew more slowly
in every year that followed until 2017.
MLA: “Inflation from 1979 to 2011: $100 is worth $310 today.” InflationCalculator.com, U.S. Bureau of Labor Statistics CPI-U data, https://inflationcalculator.com/inflation/1979-to-2011/
APA: InflationCalculator.com. Inflation from 1979 to 2011. Based on U.S. Bureau of Labor Statistics CPI-U data. Retrieved from https://inflationcalculator.com/inflation/1979-to-2011/