Value of $100 in 1995, adjusted to 2023

What happened to prices between 1995 and 2023

Between 1995 and 2023, the Consumer Price Index went from 152.4 to 304.702. Cumulatively, prices increased 99.9%, which works out to an average of 2.51% per year. Put differently, a dollar in 1995 bought what $0.50 buys in 2023: the 1995 dollar lost 50.0% of its purchasing power over these 28 years.

In 1995, gas averaged $1.15 a gallon, a new home cost roughly $133,900, and the median household earned about $34,100. Inflation ran at 2.8% for the year, little changed from 1994, as the Federal Reserve shifted from raising rates to cutting them. Having lifted its policy rate six times the year before, the Fed judged by July that the economy had cooled enough on its own, and trimmed rates instead, an outcome economists would later point to as a rare soft landing. The year opened with a currency crisis: Mexico’s peso lost roughly half its value against the dollar in a matter of weeks, and the U.S. Treasury and the IMF assembled a $50 billion rescue package, controversial in Congress, to stabilize it and keep the crisis from spreading to other emerging markets. Closer to home, a budget standoff between President Clinton and the Republican Congress shut down federal agencies twice, first for five days in November and then for 21 days spanning December into January 1996, the longest shutdown up to that point. The Postal Service raised the cost of a first-class stamp to 32 cents in January. Low, steady inflation was about the only calm part of 1995’s economic story.

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The destination year: 2023

In 2023, prices rose 4.1% and $100 from 1995 had the buying power of $200; the year's average CPI of 304.702 is the level behind every 2023 figure on this page.

2023 was the year inflation came down without a recession. Consumer prices rose 4.1% on average, roughly half of 2022’s 8.0%, and the December-to-December rate fell to 3.4%. Gasoline averaged $3.52 a gallon, well below the 2022 average, and supply-chain pressure on goods eased. Shelter, restaurant meals, and other services stayed expensive, so the CPI kept rising at a rate well above the pre-pandemic pace.

The Federal Reserve completed its rate-hiking campaign in July, taking the policy rate to 5.25–5.50%, the highest level in 22 years. The effects showed up in banking: Silicon Valley Bank failed in March after rate increases eroded the value of its bond portfolio, the second-largest bank failure in U.S. history at the time. Despite that, unemployment stayed under 4% all year.

Median household income was $80,610 according to the Census Bureau. The federal minimum wage stayed at $7.25, and a first-class stamp rose to 66 cents in July.

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