$100 in 1984 is worth $182 in 2004,
because prices increased 81.8% over that period, an average of
3.03% a year.
$100 in 1984 has
the same buying power as
$182
in 2004
Detailed inflation statistics
Cumulative price change
81.8%
Average inflation rate
3.03% per year
Converted amount ($100 base)
$182
Price difference ($100 base)
$81.81
CPI in 1984
103.9
CPI in 2004
188.9
Inflation in 1984
4.32%
Inflation in 2004
2.66%
$100 in 1984 → 2004
$182
$100 in 2004 → 1984
$55.00
What happened to prices between 1984 and 2004
Between 1984 and 2004, the Consumer Price Index went from 103.9 to 188.9.
Cumulatively, prices increased 81.8%, which works out to an average of
3.03% per year. Put differently, a dollar in 1984 bought what
$0.55 buys in 2004: the 1984 dollar
lost 45.0% of its purchasing power over
these 20 years.
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.
Every 1984 amount converts to 2004 at the same ratio, 1.82: $1,000 becomes
$1,818, and $10,000 becomes $18,181.
Amount in 1984
Value in 2004
$1.00
$1.82
$5.00
$9.09
$10.00
$18.18
$20.00
$36.36
$50.00
$90.90
$100
$182
$500
$909
$1,000
$1,818
$5,000
$9,090
$10,000
$18,181
$100,000
$181,809
$1,000,000
$1,818,094
Inflation by spending category, 1984–2004
Between 1984 and 2004, medical care rose the most, up 190.4%, while apparel rose the least, up 17.9%, against 81.8% for all items. The headline number is an average; here is what $100 of 1984
spending costs in 2004, by category:
Category
Avg. yearly inflation
$100 in 1984 →
All items (CPI-U)
3.03%
$182
Medical care
5.47%
$290
Core (all items less food & energy)
3.21%
$188
Housing
3.07%
$183
Food
2.99%
$180
Transportation
2.29%
$157
Energy
2.05%
$150
Apparel
0.83%
$118
Not shown because the BLS began these indexes after 1984: recreation (1993–), education & communication (1993–).
Decade by decade: 1984 to 2004
Prices climbed fastest in the 1980s, averaging 3.90% a year, and slowest in the 2000s (2.34% a year). Each step below chains into the full 1984–2004 change:
Years
Avg. yearly inflation
Price change
$100 from 1984, at end
1984–1990
3.90%
25.8%
$126
1990–2000
2.80%
31.8%
$166
2000–2004
2.34%
9.7%
$182
Year by year: CPI and the value of $100 from 1984
$100 from 1984 had already become $143 by
1994, on its way to $182 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 1984 had the buying
power of $182; 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 1984 to 2004: $100 is worth $182 today.” InflationCalculator.com, U.S. Bureau of Labor Statistics CPI-U data, https://inflationcalculator.com/inflation/1984-to-2004/
APA: InflationCalculator.com. Inflation from 1984 to 2004. Based on U.S. Bureau of Labor Statistics CPI-U data. Retrieved from https://inflationcalculator.com/inflation/1984-to-2004/