$100 in 1981 is worth $114 in 1984,
because prices increased 14.3% over that period, an average of
4.56% a year.
$100 in 1981 has
the same buying power as
$114
in 1984
Detailed inflation statistics
Cumulative price change
14.3%
Average inflation rate
4.56% per year
Converted amount ($100 base)
$114
Price difference ($100 base)
$14.30
CPI in 1981
90.9
CPI in 1984
103.9
Inflation in 1981
10.32%
Inflation in 1984
4.32%
$100 in 1981 → 1984
$114
$100 in 1984 → 1981
$87.49
What happened to prices between 1981 and 1984
Between 1981 and 1984, the Consumer Price Index went from 90.9 to 103.9.
Cumulatively, prices increased 14.3%, which works out to an average of
4.56% per year. Put differently, a dollar in 1981 bought what
$0.87 buys in 1984: the 1981 dollar
lost 12.5% of its purchasing power over
these 3 years.
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.
Every 1981 amount converts to 1984 at the same ratio, 1.14: $1,000 becomes
$1,143, and $10,000 becomes $11,430.
Amount in 1981
Value in 1984
$1.00
$1.14
$5.00
$5.72
$10.00
$11.43
$20.00
$22.86
$50.00
$57.15
$100
$114
$500
$572
$1,000
$1,143
$5,000
$5,715
$10,000
$11,430
$100,000
$114,301
$1,000,000
$1,143,014
Inflation by spending category, 1981–1984
Between 1981 and 1984, medical care rose the most, up 28.8%, while energy rose the least, up 3.3%, against 14.3% for all items. The headline number is an average; here is what $100 of 1981
spending costs in 1984, by category:
Category
Avg. yearly inflation
$100 in 1981 →
All items (CPI-U)
4.56%
$114
Medical care
8.81%
$129
Core (all items less food & energy)
5.45%
$117
Housing
4.65%
$115
Transportation
3.62%
$111
Food
3.31%
$110
Apparel
2.32%
$107
Energy
1.08%
$103
Not shown because the BLS began these indexes after 1981: recreation (1993–), education & communication (1993–).
Year by year: CPI and the value of $100 from 1981
$100 from 1981 had already become $106 by
1982, on its way to $114 in 1984; each row shows the CPI, that
year's inflation rate, and the running value.
Within the span, inflation peaked at 6.2% in 1982, and the smallest rise was 3.2% in 1983.
In 1984, prices rose 4.3% and $100 from 1981 had the buying
power of $114; the year's average CPI of 103.9 is the level
behind every 1984 figure on this page.
1984 was the year the recovery became a boom. Real GDP grew 7.2%, the
fastest calendar-year growth since 1951, as the tax cuts passed in 1981
combined with falling interest rates and rebuilding consumer confidence.
Unemployment, which had topped 10.8% just two years earlier, fell below
7.5%. Inflation ticked up to 4.3% from 3.2% the year before, but nothing
close to a return of the 1970s wage-price spiral: the Federal Reserve under
Paul Volcker kept policy tight enough to hold the line while growth ran hot.
The strength of the expansion, branded “Morning in America” in President
Reagan’s reelection campaign, carried him to a 49-state landslide over
Walter Mondale that November, at the time the widest electoral-vote margin
in U.S. history. For households, the numbers behind the slogan were
concrete: median income rose to about $22,400, and a gallon of gas cost
$1.13, roughly what it had cost three years earlier even as wages kept
climbing. The contrast with 1980, when 13.5% inflation and interest rates
near 20% had defined the economy, could not have been sharper.
MLA: “Inflation from 1981 to 1984: $100 is worth $114 today.” InflationCalculator.com, U.S. Bureau of Labor Statistics CPI-U data, https://inflationcalculator.com/inflation/1981-to-1984/
APA: InflationCalculator.com. Inflation from 1981 to 1984. Based on U.S. Bureau of Labor Statistics CPI-U data. Retrieved from https://inflationcalculator.com/inflation/1981-to-1984/