$100 in 1989 is worth $105 in 1990,
because prices increased 5.4% over that period, an average of
5.40% a year.
$100 in 1989 has
the same buying power as
$105
in 1990
Detailed inflation statistics
Cumulative price change
5.4%
Average inflation rate
5.40% per year
Converted amount ($100 base)
$105
Price difference ($100 base)
$5.40
CPI in 1989
124
CPI in 1990
130.7
Inflation in 1989
4.82%
Inflation in 1990
5.40%
$100 in 1989 → 1990
$105
$100 in 1990 → 1989
$94.87
What happened to prices between 1989 and 1990
Between 1989 and 1990, the Consumer Price Index went from 124 to 130.7.
Cumulatively, prices increased 5.4%, which works out to an average of
5.40% per year. Put differently, a dollar in 1989 bought what
$0.95 buys in 1990: the 1989 dollar
lost 5.1% of its purchasing power over
these 1 years.
1989 closed out a decade that began in economic crisis and ended in a long,
calmer expansion. Inflation for the year came in at 4.8%, higher than the
mid-decade lull but still roughly a third of the 13.5% peak that had opened
the decade in 1980. The federal minimum wage, unchanged at $3.35 an hour
since January 1981, had gone longer without an increase than at any point
since Congress created it, and had lost close to a third of its purchasing
power to inflation in the meantime; lawmakers would finally raise it to
$3.80 the following April. The decade’s other unfinished business came due
in August, when Congress passed FIRREA, the law that created the Resolution
Trust Corporation to seize and sell off the hundreds of savings and loan
institutions that a decade of deregulation and risky lending had left
insolvent, a bailout that eventually cost taxpayers over $100 billion. On
Wall Street, the recovery was already complete: the Dow Jones Industrial
Average closed 1989 at a record high, just over two years after Black
Monday’s 22.6% single-day crash, capping the bull market that had begun at
the Dow’s 776 low in August 1982. Between the S&L bailout, a wage floor
eroded by years without a raise, and a stock market at new highs, 1989
captured how unevenly the decade’s disinflation had been felt.
Every 1989 amount converts to 1990 at the same ratio, 1.05: $1,000 becomes
$1,054, and $10,000 becomes $10,540.
Amount in 1989
Value in 1990
$1.00
$1.05
$5.00
$5.27
$10.00
$10.54
$20.00
$21.08
$50.00
$52.70
$100
$105
$500
$527
$1,000
$1,054
$5,000
$5,270
$10,000
$10,540
$100,000
$105,403
$1,000,000
$1,054,032
Inflation by spending category, 1989–1990
Between 1989 and 1990, medical care rose the most, up 9.0%, while housing rose the least, up 4.5%, against 5.4% for all items. The headline number is an average; here is what $100 of 1989
spending costs in 1990, by category:
Category
Avg. yearly inflation
$100 in 1989 →
All items (CPI-U)
5.40%
$105
Medical care
9.04%
$109
Energy
8.27%
$108
Food
5.84%
$106
Transportation
5.61%
$106
Core (all items less food & energy)
5.04%
$105
Apparel
4.64%
$105
Housing
4.47%
$104
Not shown because the BLS began these indexes after 1989: recreation (1993–), education & communication (1993–).
Year by year: CPI and the value of $100 from 1989
$100 from 1989grew to $105 by 1990; each row
shows the CPI, that year's inflation rate, and the running value.
In 1990, prices rose 5.4% and $100 from 1989 had the buying
power of $105; the year's average CPI of 130.7 is the level
behind every 1990 figure on this page.
In 1990, the median U.S. household earned about $29,900, gas averaged $1.15 a
gallon, and mailing a letter cost a quarter. Inflation ran hot at 5.4% for the
year, its highest rate since 1982, pushed up by an oil shock after Iraq’s
invasion of Kuwait, and the economy tipped into recession that summer. It was
the last gasp of elevated inflation before the long calm of the 1990s.
MLA: “Inflation from 1989 to 1990: $100 is worth $105 today.” InflationCalculator.com, U.S. Bureau of Labor Statistics CPI-U data, https://inflationcalculator.com/inflation/1989-to-1990/
APA: InflationCalculator.com. Inflation from 1989 to 1990. Based on U.S. Bureau of Labor Statistics CPI-U data. Retrieved from https://inflationcalculator.com/inflation/1989-to-1990/