$100 in 1982 is worth $325 in 2024,
because prices increased 225.1% over that period, an average of
2.85% a year.
$100 in 1982 has
the same buying power as
$325
in 2024
Detailed inflation statistics
Cumulative price change
225.1%
Average inflation rate
2.85% per year
Converted amount ($100 base)
$325
Price difference ($100 base)
$225
CPI in 1982
96.5
CPI in 2024
313.689
Inflation in 1982
6.16%
Inflation in 2024
2.95%
$100 in 1982 → 2024
$325
$100 in 2024 → 1982
$30.76
What happened to prices between 1982 and 2024
Between 1982 and 2024, the Consumer Price Index went from 96.5 to 313.689.
Cumulatively, prices increased 225.1%, which works out to an average of
2.85% per year. Put differently, a dollar in 1982 bought what
$0.31 buys in 2024: the 1982 dollar
lost 69.2% of its purchasing power over
these 42 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 2024 at the same ratio, 3.25: $1,000 becomes
$3,251, and $10,000 becomes $32,507.
Amount in 1982
Value in 2024
$1.00
$3.25
$5.00
$16.25
$10.00
$32.51
$20.00
$65.01
$50.00
$163
$100
$325
$500
$1,625
$1,000
$3,251
$5,000
$16,253
$10,000
$32,507
$100,000
$325,066
$1,000,000
$3,250,663
Inflation by spending category, 1982–2024
Between 1982 and 2024, medical care rose the most, up 509.6%, while apparel rose the least, up 34.4%, against 225.1% for all items. The headline number is an average; here is what $100 of 1982
spending costs in 2024, by category:
Category
Avg. yearly inflation
$100 in 1982 →
All items (CPI-U)
2.85%
$325
Medical care
4.40%
$610
Housing
2.99%
$345
Food
2.95%
$339
Core (all items less food & energy)
2.91%
$333
Energy
2.50%
$282
Transportation
2.47%
$279
Apparel
0.71%
$134
Not shown because the BLS began these indexes after 1982: recreation (1993–), education & communication (1993–).
Decade by decade: 1982 to 2024
Prices climbed fastest in the 2020s, averaging 4.93% a year, and slowest in the 2010s (1.73% a year). Each step below chains into the full 1982–2024 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
2010–2020
1.73%
18.7%
$268
2020–2024
4.93%
21.2%
$325
Year by year: CPI and the value of $100 from 1982
$100 from 1982 had already become $186 by
2002, on its way to $325 in 2024; each row shows the CPI, that
year's inflation rate, and the running value.
Within the span, inflation peaked at 8.0% in 2022, 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: 2024
In 2024, prices rose 2.9% and $100 from 1982 had the buying
power of $325; the year's average CPI of 313.689 is the level
behind every 2024 figure on this page.
2024 brought inflation close to normal without fully reaching it. Consumer
prices rose 2.9% on average, the smallest yearly increase since 2020, and the
December-to-December rate was also 2.9%. Gasoline averaged $3.30 a gallon,
below 2023’s $3.52. Shelter stayed the biggest driver of the index, so the
pace of price growth in categories that households can’t easily avoid, such as
rent and insurance, lagged the drop in goods and energy costs.
The Federal Reserve declared progress in September, cutting its policy rate
by half a point, the first reduction since the pandemic emergency, and then
by a quarter point in November and again in December. Mortgage rates near 7%
kept the housing market frozen for many would-be buyers.
Median household income was $83,730, the federal minimum wage stayed at $7.25,
and a first-class stamp rose to 73 cents in July. After the November election,
attention turned to how announced tariffs and tax policy might affect prices
in 2025.
MLA: “Inflation from 1982 to 2024: $100 is worth $325 today.” InflationCalculator.com, U.S. Bureau of Labor Statistics CPI-U data, https://inflationcalculator.com/inflation/1982-to-2024/
APA: InflationCalculator.com. Inflation from 1982 to 2024. Based on U.S. Bureau of Labor Statistics CPI-U data. Retrieved from https://inflationcalculator.com/inflation/1982-to-2024/