$100 in 1999 is worth $129 in 2009,
because prices increased 28.8% over that period, an average of
2.56% a year.
$100 in 1999 has
the same buying power as
$129
in 2009
Detailed inflation statistics
Cumulative price change
28.8%
Average inflation rate
2.56% per year
Converted amount ($100 base)
$129
Price difference ($100 base)
$28.77
CPI in 1999
166.6
CPI in 2009
214.537
Inflation in 1999
2.21%
Inflation in 2009
-0.36%
$100 in 1999 → 2009
$129
$100 in 2009 → 1999
$77.66
What happened to prices between 1999 and 2009
Between 1999 and 2009, the Consumer Price Index went from 166.6 to 214.537.
Cumulatively, prices increased 28.8%, which works out to an average of
2.56% per year. Put differently, a dollar in 1999 bought what
$0.78 buys in 2009: the 1999 dollar
lost 22.3% of its purchasing power over
these 10 years.
The median household earned about $40,700 in 1999, gas averaged $1.17 a gallon, and a new home
cost roughly $161,000. Inflation ran at 2.2% for the year, ticking back up from 1998’s decade low
as oil prices recovered from their collapse. The decade closed with two changes to the financial
system that would shape the one after it: on January 1, the euro launched as an accounting
currency across 11 European countries, trading alongside national currencies like the French
franc and German mark ahead of physical cash in 2002, and in November, Congress passed the
Gramm-Leach-Bliley Act, tearing down the Depression-era wall between commercial banks, investment
banks, and insurers. Stock markets, meanwhile, were absorbed in a boom of their own: the Nasdaq
surged through the year on soaring internet-stock valuations, and the Federal Reserve raised
interest rates three times in the second half of 1999 partly to cool the exuberance, even as it
pumped extra liquidity into the banking system to guard against any disruption from the Y2K
rollover. A first-class stamp cost 33 cents. Inflation had spent the decade falling from 1990’s
5.4% peak to averages closer to 2-3%, and 1999 closed it out almost exactly where the 1990s as a
whole had settled.
Every 1999 amount converts to 2009 at the same ratio, 1.29: $1,000 becomes
$1,288, and $10,000 becomes $12,877.
Amount in 1999
Value in 2009
$1.00
$1.29
$5.00
$6.44
$10.00
$12.88
$20.00
$25.75
$50.00
$64.39
$100
$129
$500
$644
$1,000
$1,288
$5,000
$6,439
$10,000
$12,877
$100,000
$128,774
$1,000,000
$1,287,737
Inflation by spending category, 1999–2009
Between 1999 and 2009, energy rose the most, up 81.2%, while apparel fell 8.5%, against 28.8% for all items. The headline number is an average; here is what $100 of 1999
spending costs in 2009, by category:
Category
Avg. yearly inflation
$100 in 1999 →
All items (CPI-U)
2.56%
$129
Energy
6.12%
$181
Medical care
4.13%
$150
Food
2.88%
$133
Housing
2.85%
$132
Education & communication
2.33%
$126
Transportation
2.19%
$124
Core (all items less food & energy)
2.16%
$124
Recreation
1.14%
$112
Apparel
-0.89%
$91.45
Decade by decade: 1999 to 2009
Prices climbed fastest in the 1990s, averaging 3.36% a year, and slowest in the 2000s (2.47% a year). Each step below chains into the full 1999–2009 change:
Years
Avg. yearly inflation
Price change
$100 from 1999, at end
1999–2000
3.36%
3.4%
$103
2000–2009
2.47%
24.6%
$129
Year by year: CPI and the value of $100 from 1999
$100 from 1999 had already become $113 by
2004, on its way to $129 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 1999 had the buying
power of $129; 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 1999 to 2009: $100 is worth $129 today.” InflationCalculator.com, U.S. Bureau of Labor Statistics CPI-U data, https://inflationcalculator.com/inflation/1999-to-2009/
APA: InflationCalculator.com. Inflation from 1999 to 2009. Based on U.S. Bureau of Labor Statistics CPI-U data. Retrieved from https://inflationcalculator.com/inflation/1999-to-2009/