$100 in 1982 is worth $233 in 2011,
because prices increased 133.1% over that period, an average of
2.96% a year.
$100 in 1982 has
the same buying power as
$233
in 2011
Detailed inflation statistics
Cumulative price change
133.1%
Average inflation rate
2.96% per year
Converted amount ($100 base)
$233
Price difference ($100 base)
$133
CPI in 1982
96.5
CPI in 2011
224.939
Inflation in 1982
6.16%
Inflation in 2011
3.16%
$100 in 1982 → 2011
$233
$100 in 2011 → 1982
$42.90
What happened to prices between 1982 and 2011
Between 1982 and 2011, the Consumer Price Index went from 96.5 to 224.939.
Cumulatively, prices increased 133.1%, which works out to an average of
2.96% per year. Put differently, a dollar in 1982 bought what
$0.43 buys in 2011: the 1982 dollar
lost 57.1% of its purchasing power over
these 29 years.
1982 was the hard bottom of the disinflation Paul Volcker had set in motion.
Consumer prices rose just 6.2% for the year, roughly half of 1981’s rate and a
fraction of the 13.5% peak from two years earlier. The price fell because
demand had been crushed: the recession that began in July 1981 did not
officially end until November 1982, and unemployment kept climbing even as
the economy technically began to recover, reaching 10.8% in November and
December, the highest rate since the Great Depression. Manufacturing and
construction, especially the auto and housing industries starved of credit by
double-digit interest rates, bore the worst of it. Abroad, Mexico’s August
announcement that it could not service its foreign debt opened a Latin
American debt crisis that spread across the region and forced the Federal
Reserve and IMF into emergency lending. The stress on the financial system
pushed Volcker to start easing interest rates that October, stepping back
from the strict money-supply targets he had followed since 1979. Markets read
the shift correctly: the Dow Jones Industrial Average bottomed at 776.92 in
mid-August, and the rally that followed became the opening leg of the 1980s
bull market. By year’s end, the trade-off Volcker had bet on was becoming
visible: much lower inflation, at the cost of the worst unemployment in 40
years.
Every 1982 amount converts to 2011 at the same ratio, 2.33: $1,000 becomes
$2,331, and $10,000 becomes $23,310.
Amount in 1982
Value in 2011
$1.00
$2.33
$5.00
$11.65
$10.00
$23.31
$20.00
$46.62
$50.00
$117
$100
$233
$500
$1,165
$1,000
$2,331
$5,000
$11,655
$10,000
$23,310
$100,000
$233,097
$1,000,000
$2,330,974
Inflation by spending category, 1982–2011
Between 1982 and 2011, medical care rose the most, up 332.7%, while apparel rose the least, up 24.9%, against 133.1% for all items. The headline number is an average; here is what $100 of 1982
spending costs in 2011, by category:
Category
Avg. yearly inflation
$100 in 1982 →
All items (CPI-U)
2.96%
$233
Medical care
5.18%
$433
Energy
3.15%
$246
Core (all items less food & energy)
2.99%
$235
Food
2.97%
$234
Housing
2.85%
$226
Transportation
2.74%
$219
Apparel
0.77%
$125
Not shown because the BLS began these indexes after 1982: recreation (1993–), education & communication (1993–).
Decade by decade: 1982 to 2011
Prices climbed fastest in the 1980s, averaging 3.86% a year, and slowest in the 2000s (2.39% a year). Each step below chains into the full 1982–2011 change:
Years
Avg. yearly inflation
Price change
$100 from 1982, at end
1982–1990
3.86%
35.4%
$135
1990–2000
2.80%
31.8%
$178
2000–2010
2.39%
26.6%
$226
2010–2011
3.16%
3.2%
$233
Year by year: CPI and the value of $100 from 1982
$100 from 1982 had already become $163 by
1996, on its way to $233 in 2011; each row shows the CPI, that
year's inflation rate, and the running value.
Within the span, inflation peaked at 5.4% in 1990, and prices fell 0.4% in 2009, the deepest deflation of the period.
In 2011, prices rose 3.2% and $100 from 1982 had the buying
power of $233; 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 1982 to 2011: $100 is worth $233 today.” InflationCalculator.com, U.S. Bureau of Labor Statistics CPI-U data, https://inflationcalculator.com/inflation/1982-to-2011/
APA: InflationCalculator.com. Inflation from 1982 to 2011. Based on U.S. Bureau of Labor Statistics CPI-U data. Retrieved from https://inflationcalculator.com/inflation/1982-to-2011/