$100 in 1979 is worth $373 in 2021,
because prices increased 273.2% over that period, an average of
3.19% a year.
$100 in 1979 has
the same buying power as
$373
in 2021
Detailed inflation statistics
Cumulative price change
273.2%
Average inflation rate
3.19% per year
Converted amount ($100 base)
$373
Price difference ($100 base)
$273
CPI in 1979
72.6
CPI in 2021
270.97
Inflation in 1979
11.35%
Inflation in 2021
4.70%
$100 in 1979 → 2021
$373
$100 in 2021 → 1979
$26.79
What happened to prices between 1979 and 2021
Between 1979 and 2021, the Consumer Price Index went from 72.6 to 270.97.
Cumulatively, prices increased 273.2%, which works out to an average of
3.19% per year. Put differently, a dollar in 1979 bought what
$0.27 buys in 2021: the 1979 dollar
lost 73.2% of its purchasing power over
these 42 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 2021 at the same ratio, 3.73: $1,000 becomes
$3,732, and $10,000 becomes $37,324.
Amount in 1979
Value in 2021
$1.00
$3.73
$5.00
$18.66
$10.00
$37.32
$20.00
$74.65
$50.00
$187
$100
$373
$500
$1,866
$1,000
$3,732
$5,000
$18,662
$10,000
$37,324
$100,000
$373,237
$1,000,000
$3,732,369
Inflation by spending category, 1979–2021
Between 1979 and 2021, medical care rose the most, up 678.2%, while apparel rose the least, up 42.5%, against 273.2% for all items. The headline number is an average; here is what $100 of 1979
spending costs in 2021, by category:
Category
Avg. yearly inflation
$100 in 1979 →
All items (CPI-U)
3.19%
$373
Medical care
5.01%
$778
Housing
3.36%
$400
Core (all items less food & energy)
3.27%
$386
Energy
3.12%
$363
Food
3.01%
$348
Transportation
2.86%
$327
Apparel
0.85%
$143
Not shown because the BLS began these indexes after 1979: recreation (1993–), education & communication (1993–).
Decade by decade: 1979 to 2021
Prices climbed fastest in the 1970s, averaging 13.50% a year, and slowest in the 2010s (1.73% a year). Each step below chains into the full 1979–2021 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
2010–2020
1.73%
18.7%
$356
2020–2021
4.70%
4.7%
$373
Year by year: CPI and the value of $100 from 1979
$100 from 1979 had already become $229 by
1999, on its way to $373 in 2021; 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: 2021
In 2021, prices rose 4.7% and $100 from 1979 had the buying
power of $373; the year's average CPI of 270.97 is the level
behind every 2021 figure on this page.
2021 was the year inflation stopped being background noise. Consumer prices
rose 4.7% on average for the year, and the pace kept building as the months
went on: by December, the 12-month rate had reached 7.0%, the highest since
1982. The proximate cause was a supply chain that could not keep up with a
fast-reopening economy. A global semiconductor shortage choked new car
production and pushed used vehicle prices up by more than a third, the
single largest line item in the year’s inflation math. Lumber, appliances,
and shipping capacity told versions of the same story: demand snapped back
faster than factories, ports, and truckers could handle it. Washington added
fuel in March with the $1.9 trillion American Rescue Plan, on top of the
relief already in the pipeline since 2020. For most of the year, the Federal
Reserve called the price surge “transitory,” a temporary reopening effect
expected to fade on its own, and held its policy rate near zero. By
November, with inflation still climbing, the Fed reversed course and began
winding down its bond purchases, the first step toward the rate hikes that
would follow in 2022. Gas averaged $3.01 a gallon for the year, up from
about $2.17 in 2020, while the federal minimum wage held at $7.25,
unchanged since 2009. In hindsight, 2021 reads as the hinge year: the point
where “transitory” inflation became the multi-year fight the Fed spent the
next two years trying to win.
MLA: “Inflation from 1979 to 2021: $100 is worth $373 today.” InflationCalculator.com, U.S. Bureau of Labor Statistics CPI-U data, https://inflationcalculator.com/inflation/1979-to-2021/
APA: InflationCalculator.com. Inflation from 1979 to 2021. Based on U.S. Bureau of Labor Statistics CPI-U data. Retrieved from https://inflationcalculator.com/inflation/1979-to-2021/