$100 in 1980 is worth $159 in 1990,
because prices increased 58.6% over that period, an average of
4.72% a year.
$100 in 1980 has
the same buying power as
$159
in 1990
Detailed inflation statistics
Cumulative price change
58.6%
Average inflation rate
4.72% per year
Converted amount ($100 base)
$159
Price difference ($100 base)
$58.62
CPI in 1980
82.4
CPI in 1990
130.7
Inflation in 1980
13.50%
Inflation in 1990
5.40%
$100 in 1980 → 1990
$159
$100 in 1990 → 1980
$63.05
What happened to prices between 1980 and 1990
Between 1980 and 1990, the Consumer Price Index went from 82.4 to 130.7.
Cumulatively, prices increased 58.6%, which works out to an average of
4.72% per year. Put differently, a dollar in 1980 bought what
$0.63 buys in 1990: the 1980 dollar
lost 37.0% of its purchasing power over
these 10 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 1990 at the same ratio, 1.59: $1,000 becomes
$1,586, and $10,000 becomes $15,862.
Amount in 1980
Value in 1990
$1.00
$1.59
$5.00
$7.93
$10.00
$15.86
$20.00
$31.72
$50.00
$79.31
$100
$159
$500
$793
$1,000
$1,586
$5,000
$7,931
$10,000
$15,862
$100,000
$158,617
$1,000,000
$1,586,165
Inflation by spending category, 1980–1990
Between 1980 and 1990, medical care rose the most, up 117.4%, while energy rose the least, up 18.7%, against 58.6% for all items. The headline number is an average; here is what $100 of 1980
spending costs in 1990, by category:
Category
Avg. yearly inflation
$100 in 1980 →
All items (CPI-U)
4.72%
$159
Medical care
8.07%
$217
Core (all items less food & energy)
5.31%
$168
Housing
4.71%
$158
Food
4.31%
$153
Transportation
3.79%
$145
Apparel
3.16%
$137
Energy
1.73%
$119
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 1980 had already become $131 by
1985, on its way to $159 in 1990; each row shows the CPI, that
year's inflation rate, and the running value.
Within the span, inflation peaked at 10.3% in 1981, and the smallest rise was 1.9% in 1986.
In 1990, prices rose 5.4% and $100 from 1980 had the buying
power of $159; the year's average CPI of 130.7 is the level
behind every 1990 figure on this page.
In 1990, the median U.S. household earned about $29,900, gas averaged $1.15 a
gallon, and mailing a letter cost a quarter. Inflation ran hot at 5.4% for the
year, its highest rate since 1982, pushed up by an oil shock after Iraq’s
invasion of Kuwait, and the economy tipped into recession that summer. It was
the last gasp of elevated inflation before the long calm of the 1990s.
MLA: “Inflation from 1980 to 1990: $100 is worth $159 today.” InflationCalculator.com, U.S. Bureau of Labor Statistics CPI-U data, https://inflationcalculator.com/inflation/1980-to-1990/
APA: InflationCalculator.com. Inflation from 1980 to 1990. Based on U.S. Bureau of Labor Statistics CPI-U data. Retrieved from https://inflationcalculator.com/inflation/1980-to-1990/