$100 in 1980 is worth $110 in 1981,
because prices increased 10.3% over that period, an average of
10.32% a year.
$100 in 1980 has
the same buying power as
$110
in 1981
Detailed inflation statistics
Cumulative price change
10.3%
Average inflation rate
10.32% per year
Converted amount ($100 base)
$110
Price difference ($100 base)
$10.32
CPI in 1980
82.4
CPI in 1981
90.9
Inflation in 1980
13.50%
Inflation in 1981
10.32%
$100 in 1980 → 1981
$110
$100 in 1981 → 1980
$90.65
What happened to prices between 1980 and 1981
Between 1980 and 1981, the Consumer Price Index went from 82.4 to 90.9.
Cumulatively, prices increased 10.3%, which works out to an average of
10.32% per year. Put differently, a dollar in 1980 bought what
$0.91 buys in 1981: the 1980 dollar
lost 9.4% of its purchasing power over
these 1 years.
1980 sat at the very peak of the Great Inflation. Prices rose 13.5% in that
single year, mortgage rates were climbing toward 16%, and the Federal Reserve
under Paul Volcker was administering the painful interest-rate medicine that
would finally break the inflationary spiral, at the cost of the deep 1981–82
recession. No single year looms larger in how Americans think about inflation.
Every 1980 amount converts to 1981 at the same ratio, 1.10: $1,000 becomes
$1,103, and $10,000 becomes $11,032.
Amount in 1980
Value in 1981
$1.00
$1.10
$5.00
$5.52
$10.00
$11.03
$20.00
$22.06
$50.00
$55.16
$100
$110
$500
$552
$1,000
$1,103
$5,000
$5,516
$10,000
$11,032
$100,000
$110,316
$1,000,000
$1,103,155
Inflation by spending category, 1980–1981
Between 1980 and 1981, energy rose the most, up 13.6%, while apparel rose the least, up 4.8%, against 10.3% for all items. The headline number is an average; here is what $100 of 1980
spending costs in 1981, by category:
Category
Avg. yearly inflation
$100 in 1980 →
All items (CPI-U)
10.32%
$110
Energy
13.60%
$114
Transportation
12.15%
$112
Housing
11.47%
$111
Medical care
10.68%
$111
Core (all items less food & energy)
10.40%
$110
Food
7.83%
$108
Apparel
4.84%
$105
Not shown because the BLS began these indexes after 1980: recreation (1993–), education & communication (1993–).
Year by year: CPI and the value of $100 from 1980
$100 from 1980grew to $110 by 1981; each row
shows the CPI, that year's inflation rate, and the running value.
In 1981, prices rose 10.3% and $100 from 1980 had the buying
power of $110; the year's average CPI of 90.9 is the level
behind every 1981 figure on this page.
1981 was the year the inflation fever finally broke, at an extraordinary price.
Consumer prices rose 10.3%, the second year of back-to-back double-digit
inflation and the last time the U.S. would see one. To end it, Paul Volcker’s
Federal Reserve drove its policy rate above 19% and let borrowing costs go
where they may: a 30-year mortgage cost more than 18% by autumn, car loans and
business credit froze, and homebuilders mailed the Fed two-by-fours in protest.
The squeeze tipped the economy into recession in July, the deep 1981–82
downturn that would push unemployment past 10%. But it worked. Inflation fell
by nearly half within a year and to under 4% by 1983, the disinflation that
defined the following two decades. Even the price of mailing a letter told the
year’s story: postage went up twice in eight months.
MLA: “Inflation from 1980 to 1981: $100 is worth $110 today.” InflationCalculator.com, U.S. Bureau of Labor Statistics CPI-U data, https://inflationcalculator.com/inflation/1980-to-1981/
APA: InflationCalculator.com. Inflation from 1980 to 1981. Based on U.S. Bureau of Labor Statistics CPI-U data. Retrieved from https://inflationcalculator.com/inflation/1980-to-1981/