$100 in 1994 is worth $175 in 2020,
because prices increased 74.6% over that period, an average of
2.17% a year.
$100 in 1994 has
the same buying power as
$175
in 2020
Detailed inflation statistics
Cumulative price change
74.6%
Average inflation rate
2.17% per year
Converted amount ($100 base)
$175
Price difference ($100 base)
$74.64
CPI in 1994
148.2
CPI in 2020
258.811
Inflation in 1994
2.56%
Inflation in 2020
1.23%
$100 in 1994 → 2020
$175
$100 in 2020 → 1994
$57.26
What happened to prices between 1994 and 2020
Between 1994 and 2020, the Consumer Price Index went from 148.2 to 258.811.
Cumulatively, prices increased 74.6%, which works out to an average of
2.17% per year. Put differently, a dollar in 1994 bought what
$0.57 buys in 2020: the 1994 dollar
lost 42.7% of its purchasing power over
these 26 years.
Gas averaged $1.11 a gallon in 1994, a new home cost roughly $130,000, and the median household
earned about $32,300. Inflation ran at 2.6% for the year, the calmest reading since the
mid-1980s, even as the Federal Reserve spent the year raising interest rates precisely to keep
it that way. Chair Alan Greenspan’s Fed lifted the federal funds rate from 3% to 5.5% over six
moves, a preemptive tightening campaign meant to head off inflation before it built rather than
react to it after the fact. The bond market, unprepared for such a rapid climb, sold off
sharply, and the higher rates rippled into places few had expected: Orange County, California,
whose investment pool had bet heavily on rates staying low, filed for bankruptcy in December
after losing an estimated $1.7 billion, the largest municipal bankruptcy in the country’s
history at the time. On the trade front, NAFTA took effect January 1, phasing out tariffs on
thousands of goods moving between the U.S., Mexico, and Canada, the start of a schedule that
would eliminate most remaining barriers over the following decade. It was a year that showed
inflation control could have its own costs, paid out in the bond market and, in Orange County’s
case, a bankruptcy court.
Every 1994 amount converts to 2020 at the same ratio, 1.75: $1,000 becomes
$1,746, and $10,000 becomes $17,464.
Amount in 1994
Value in 2020
$1.00
$1.75
$5.00
$8.73
$10.00
$17.46
$20.00
$34.93
$50.00
$87.32
$100
$175
$500
$873
$1,000
$1,746
$5,000
$8,732
$10,000
$17,464
$100,000
$174,636
$1,000,000
$1,746,363
Inflation by spending category, 1994–2020
Between 1994 and 2020, medical care rose the most, up 145.9%, while apparel fell 11.5%, against 74.6% for all items. The headline number is an average; here is what $100 of 1994
spending costs in 2020, by category:
Category
Avg. yearly inflation
$100 in 1994 →
All items (CPI-U)
2.17%
$175
Medical care
3.52%
$246
Energy
2.46%
$188
Housing
2.45%
$188
Food
2.40%
$185
Core (all items less food & energy)
2.09%
$171
Education & communication
1.77%
$158
Transportation
1.57%
$150
Recreation
1.07%
$132
Apparel
-0.47%
$88.51
Decade by decade: 1994 to 2020
Prices climbed fastest in the 1990s, averaging 2.53% a year, and slowest in the 2010s (1.73% a year). Each step below chains into the full 1994–2020 change:
Years
Avg. yearly inflation
Price change
$100 from 1994, at end
1994–2000
2.53%
16.2%
$116
2000–2010
2.39%
26.6%
$147
2010–2020
1.73%
18.7%
$175
Year by year: CPI and the value of $100 from 1994
$100 from 1994 had already become $140 by
2007, on its way to $175 in 2020; 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 2020, prices rose 1.2% and $100 from 1994 had the buying
power of $175; the year's average CPI of 258.811 is the level
behind every 2020 figure on this page.
2020 was the year the pandemic rewired the price data without triggering the
inflation spike that followed it. Consumer prices rose just 1.2% for the
year, the mildest pace since 2015, as COVID-19 lockdowns emptied roads,
closed airports, and crushed energy demand. Oil told the starkest story: on
April 20, U.S. crude futures fell to about negative $37 a barrel, the first
negative settlement in the market’s history, as storage capacity ran out and no one
wanted the physical barrels. Gasoline followed it down, falling to about
$1.80 a gallon nationally that month before recovering to average $2.17 for
the year. Grocery prices moved the other way: pantry stocking and
meatpacking-plant disruptions pushed food-at-home costs up faster than
usual, a rare case of food and energy pulling the index in opposite
directions. Washington answered with the $2.2 trillion CARES Act, signed
March 27, which sent $1,200 payments to most adults and added $600 a week
to unemployment benefits as states ordered widespread business closures.
The Federal Reserve cut its policy rate to near zero in two emergency moves
that same month and pledged to buy Treasury and mortgage bonds “in the
amounts needed” to keep credit markets working, an open-ended commitment
beyond even its 2008 response. None of it showed up in the CPI yet: the
stimulus, the supply shocks, and the reopening whiplash that followed would
build into the fastest inflation in four decades over the next two years.
MLA: “Inflation from 1994 to 2020: $100 is worth $175 today.” InflationCalculator.com, U.S. Bureau of Labor Statistics CPI-U data, https://inflationcalculator.com/inflation/1994-to-2020/
APA: InflationCalculator.com. Inflation from 1994 to 2020. Based on U.S. Bureau of Labor Statistics CPI-U data. Retrieved from https://inflationcalculator.com/inflation/1994-to-2020/