$100 in 1993 is worth $148 in 2009,
because prices increased 48.5% over that period, an average of
2.50% a year.
$100 in 1993 has
the same buying power as
$148
in 2009
Detailed inflation statistics
Cumulative price change
48.5%
Average inflation rate
2.50% per year
Converted amount ($100 base)
$148
Price difference ($100 base)
$48.47
CPI in 1993
144.5
CPI in 2009
214.537
Inflation in 1993
2.99%
Inflation in 2009
-0.36%
$100 in 1993 → 2009
$148
$100 in 2009 → 1993
$67.35
What happened to prices between 1993 and 2009
Between 1993 and 2009, the Consumer Price Index went from 144.5 to 214.537.
Cumulatively, prices increased 48.5%, which works out to an average of
2.50% per year. Put differently, a dollar in 1993 bought what
$0.67 buys in 2009: the 1993 dollar
lost 32.6% of its purchasing power over
these 16 years.
By 1993, the median household earned about $31,200, gas averaged $1.11 a gallon, and a new home
cost roughly $126,500. Inflation ran at 3.0% for the year, holding close to where it had settled
the year before as the recovery slowly gathered strength. Washington spent much of the year on
two pieces of unfinished business from the recession: a deficit-reduction package, the Omnibus
Budget Reconciliation Act, that raised the top income tax rate to 39.6% to start narrowing a
budget gap left over from the 1980s, and a trade deal, the North American Free Trade Agreement,
that President Clinton signed into law in December after a contentious fight in Congress. NAFTA
phased out most tariffs between the U.S., Mexico, and Canada and took effect the following
January. The year’s other defining event had nothing to do with the economy: in February, a bomb
exploded in the World Trade Center’s parking garage, killing six people and injuring more than a
thousand. By year’s end, the pieces of the decade’s later economic story, freer trade, a
shrinking deficit, and inflation holding near 3%, were already in place.
Every 1993 amount converts to 2009 at the same ratio, 1.48: $1,000 becomes
$1,485, and $10,000 becomes $14,847.
Amount in 1993
Value in 2009
$1.00
$1.48
$5.00
$7.42
$10.00
$14.85
$20.00
$29.69
$50.00
$74.23
$100
$148
$500
$742
$1,000
$1,485
$5,000
$7,423
$10,000
$14,847
$100,000
$148,469
$1,000,000
$1,484,685
Inflation by spending category, 1993–2009
Between 1993 and 2009, medical care rose the most, up 86.5%, while apparel fell 10.2%, against 48.5% for all items. The headline number is an average; here is what $100 of 1993
spending costs in 2009, by category:
Category
Avg. yearly inflation
$100 in 1993 →
All items (CPI-U)
2.50%
$148
Medical care
3.97%
$187
Energy
3.93%
$185
Food
2.76%
$155
Housing
2.72%
$154
Education & communication
2.52%
$149
Core (all items less food & energy)
2.31%
$144
Transportation
2.01%
$137
Recreation
1.45%
$126
Apparel
-0.67%
$89.81
Decade by decade: 1993 to 2009
Prices climbed fastest in the 1990s, averaging 2.54% a year, and slowest in the 2000s (2.47% a year). Each step below chains into the full 1993–2009 change:
Years
Avg. yearly inflation
Price change
$100 from 1993, at end
1993–2000
2.54%
19.2%
$119
2000–2009
2.47%
24.6%
$148
Year by year: CPI and the value of $100 from 1993
$100 from 1993 had already become $123 by
2001, on its way to $148 in 2009; each row shows the CPI, that
year's inflation rate, and the running value.
Within the span, inflation peaked at 3.8% in 2008, and prices fell 0.4% in 2009, the deepest deflation of the period.
In 2009, prices fell 0.4% and $100 from 1993 had the buying
power of $148; the year's average CPI of 214.537 is the level
behind every 2009 figure on this page.
2009 is the rarest kind of year in the modern price data: one where the cost
of living went down. The CPI fell 0.4%, the first full-year deflation
since 1955, as the Great Recession hollowed out demand and oil unwound from
its $147 spike the summer before. Gasoline that had cost over $4 a gallon in
July 2008 averaged $2.35 in 2009, and that energy collapse dragged the
12-month inflation rate to −2.1% by July, the deepest reading since 1950.
Policymakers treated falling prices not as relief but as a warning: deflation
raises the real weight of debt precisely when households are drowning in it,
which is why the Federal Reserve pinned interest rates near zero, began buying
bonds by the hundreds of billions, and Washington passed a $787 billion
stimulus. The medicine took: prices stabilized within a year, and 2009 remains
the textbook case of why central banks fear deflation more than moderate
inflation.
MLA: “Inflation from 1993 to 2009: $100 is worth $148 today.” InflationCalculator.com, U.S. Bureau of Labor Statistics CPI-U data, https://inflationcalculator.com/inflation/1993-to-2009/
APA: InflationCalculator.com. Inflation from 1993 to 2009. Based on U.S. Bureau of Labor Statistics CPI-U data. Retrieved from https://inflationcalculator.com/inflation/1993-to-2009/