$100 in 1983 is worth $190 in 2004,
because prices increased 89.7% over that period, an average of
3.09% a year.
$100 in 1983 has
the same buying power as
$190
in 2004
Detailed inflation statistics
Cumulative price change
89.7%
Average inflation rate
3.09% per year
Converted amount ($100 base)
$190
Price difference ($100 base)
$89.66
CPI in 1983
99.6
CPI in 2004
188.9
Inflation in 1983
3.21%
Inflation in 2004
2.66%
$100 in 1983 → 2004
$190
$100 in 2004 → 1983
$52.73
What happened to prices between 1983 and 2004
Between 1983 and 2004, the Consumer Price Index went from 99.6 to 188.9.
Cumulatively, prices increased 89.7%, which works out to an average of
3.09% per year. Put differently, a dollar in 1983 bought what
$0.53 buys in 2004: the 1983 dollar
lost 47.3% of its purchasing power over
these 21 years.
1983 confirmed that the Volcker disinflation was not a one-year fluke.
Consumer prices rose 3.2% for the year, nearly identical to 1982’s pace and a
fraction of the double-digit rates of 1980 and 1981. With inflation tamed and
interest rates coming down, the economy roared back from the 1981-82
recession: real GDP grew 4.6%, the strongest calendar-year growth since the
1950s, and unemployment fell from its 10.8% peak to 8.3% by December. Housing
and auto sales, both starved of credit during the recession, led the
rebound. In April, Congress and President Reagan enacted the Social Security
Amendments of 1983, a bipartisan rescue of a system projected to run out of
money within months. The law gradually raised the full retirement age from
65 to 67, began taxing benefits for higher-income retirees, and delayed that
year’s cost-of-living adjustment by six months. For a program whose benefits
had been indexed to the CPI since 1975, the amendments were the first major
sign that inflation-proofing Social Security carried a cost Congress could
not simply legislate away. By year’s end, gas averaged $1.16 a gallon and
mailing a letter still cost 20 cents, prices that had barely moved since
1981, a sharp break from the constant increases of the previous decade.
Every 1983 amount converts to 2004 at the same ratio, 1.90: $1,000 becomes
$1,897, and $10,000 becomes $18,966.
Amount in 1983
Value in 2004
$1.00
$1.90
$5.00
$9.48
$10.00
$18.97
$20.00
$37.93
$50.00
$94.83
$100
$190
$500
$948
$1,000
$1,897
$5,000
$9,483
$10,000
$18,966
$100,000
$189,659
$1,000,000
$1,896,586
Inflation by spending category, 1983–2004
Between 1983 and 2004, medical care rose the most, up 208.3%, while apparel rose the least, up 20.2%, against 89.7% for all items. The headline number is an average; here is what $100 of 1983
spending costs in 2004, by category:
Category
Avg. yearly inflation
$100 in 1983 →
All items (CPI-U)
3.09%
$190
Medical care
5.51%
$308
Core (all items less food & energy)
3.29%
$197
Housing
3.12%
$190
Food
3.03%
$187
Transportation
2.39%
$164
Energy
2.00%
$152
Apparel
0.88%
$120
Not shown because the BLS began these indexes after 1983: recreation (1993–), education & communication (1993–).
Decade by decade: 1983 to 2004
Prices climbed fastest in the 1980s, averaging 3.96% a year, and slowest in the 2000s (2.34% a year). Each step below chains into the full 1983–2004 change:
Years
Avg. yearly inflation
Price change
$100 from 1983, at end
1983–1990
3.96%
31.2%
$131
1990–2000
2.80%
31.8%
$173
2000–2004
2.34%
9.7%
$190
Year by year: CPI and the value of $100 from 1983
$100 from 1983 had already become $145 by
1993, on its way to $190 in 2004; 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 the smallest rise was 1.6% in 1998.
In 2004, prices rose 2.7% and $100 from 1983 had the buying
power of $190; the year's average CPI of 188.9 is the level
behind every 2004 figure on this page.
Consumer prices rose 2.7% in 2004, with a 29-cent jump in the price of gasoline, to $1.88 a
gallon, doing much of the work. Crude oil passed $50 a barrel in October on rising demand
from China and India. The Federal Reserve raised rates for the first time in four years on
June 30, to 1.25%, and it kept going: 17 consecutive quarter-point increases took the rate to
5.25% by June 2006. Housing was already running ahead of incomes. The median household earned
about $44,300, up 2.3% from 2003, while the median new home sold for $221,000, up about 13%. A
first-class stamp stayed at 37 cents and the federal minimum wage at $5.15, unchanged since
1997.
MLA: “Inflation from 1983 to 2004: $100 is worth $190 today.” InflationCalculator.com, U.S. Bureau of Labor Statistics CPI-U data, https://inflationcalculator.com/inflation/1983-to-2004/
APA: InflationCalculator.com. Inflation from 1983 to 2004. Based on U.S. Bureau of Labor Statistics CPI-U data. Retrieved from https://inflationcalculator.com/inflation/1983-to-2004/