Convert money between any two years with official US CPI data back to 1913, or project what you will need in future dollars at an assumed rate.
Uses the published CPI-U index for both years, so the answer is a lookup rather than an assumption.
CPI-U annual averages, US Bureau of Labor Statistics series CUUR0000SA0, index base 1982-84 = 100. The 2026 row is the average of 7 published months.
| Year | CPI-U | $1 then, today | Cumulative |
|---|---|---|---|
| 1913 | 9.9 | $33.45 | 3,245.3% |
| 1930 | 16.7 | $19.83 | 1,883.1% |
| 1950 | 24.1 | $13.74 | 1,274.2% |
| 1970 | 38.8 | $8.54 | 753.6% |
| 1980 | 82.4 | $4.02 | 301.9% |
| 1990 | 130.7 | $2.53 | 153.4% |
| 2000 | 172.2 | $1.92 | 92.3% |
| 2010 | 218.056 | $1.52 | 51.9% |
| 2020 | 258.811 | $1.28 | 28.0% |
| 2026 | 331.18 | $1 | 0.0% |
The compounded annual rate is compared to three published reference points: the Federal Reserve's 2% longer-run goal (stated for the PCE index, not CPI), the 3.16% long-run CPI-U average across 1913-2026, and the 7.82% pace of the 1970-1980 Great Inflation.
CPI-U measures a national average basket of urban consumer goods. Your own inflation depends on where you live and what you buy, and can differ substantially — housing, medical care and tuition have all outpaced the overall index for decades. Figures here are for comparison and planning, not financial advice.
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Enter an amount and two years and this calculator converts between them using the official Consumer Price Index published by the US Bureau of Labor Statistics, which runs back to 1913. It answers the question people actually ask — what is $100 in 1980 worth today, what was a 1990 salary really paying, how much has a dollar lost since the pandemic — and it shows both directions at once, because prices rising and money buying less are two ways of describing one change, not the same number twice.
The CPI-U tracks the average price of a basket of goods and services bought by urban consumers. It is an index, not a price: the base period 1982-84 is set to 100, so a value of 331.18 means prices are 3.31 times the 1982-84 level. Converting money between years is a ratio of two index values, which is why a CPI-based answer is a lookup rather than an assumption. To go forward instead, there is no index yet, so a rate has to be assumed — this calculator starts from the long-run average of the same series rather than a round number.
Formula
Work out what a historical price, wage or budget figure would be in current dollars.
Check whether an increase actually kept pace with prices or only looked like it did.
Translate a target income today into the number you will need decades from now.
Quote a historical figure in modern terms with a source a reader can check.
See how much buying power a fixed sum has lost since 2019, 2021 or last year.
Every historical answer comes from the published CPI-U index for both years, so it matches what the BLS and the Federal Reserve report.
Prices doubling is buying power halving. Seeing +100% and −50% together is what stops the two being confused.
Put a 1990 wage, a 2000 house price or a 1970s ticket price into today's money and compare like with like.
Project forward at a rate you choose to see what a target income needs to be in future dollars.
The full published series, including the deflation of the 1930s and the Great Inflation of the 1970s.
About $402. The CPI-U averaged 82.4 in 1980 and 331.18 so far in 2026, so prices are roughly 4.02 times higher. Put another way, $100 kept as cash since 1980 now buys what about $24.88 bought then — a loss of around 75% of its buying power.
About $33.45. 1913 is the first year of the CPI-U, and prices have risen roughly 3,245% since, which works out to about 3.16% a year compounded over more than a century.
From the US Bureau of Labor Statistics series CUUR0000SA0 — the CPI for All Urban Consumers, US city average, all items, not seasonally adjusted, with the 1982-84 base set to 100. The values were cross-checked against the Federal Reserve Bank of Minneapolis published table of the same series.
Almost always because of which endpoint they use. Some compare annual averages, some compare a specific month, and for the year in progress some publish an estimate of where the year will close. This calculator uses annual averages, and for the current year the average of the months actually published, so nothing shown is a forecast.
The forward mode starts at about 3.16%, the compounded average of the whole published CPI-U series since 1913. The Federal Reserve targets 2% over the longer run, though it states that goal for the PCE index rather than CPI. Anything between those two is a defensible planning assumption; the honest answer is that nobody knows.
No, and treating them as the same is a common error. They are reciprocals. If prices double, cumulative inflation is +100% but buying power falls by 50%, not 100%. This calculator reports both so the difference is visible.
Only roughly. CPI-U is a national average across urban consumers. Your personal rate depends on your rent or mortgage, your health care, whether you have children in college and where you live. Housing, medical care and tuition have all risen faster than the overall index for decades.
Yes. Prices fell in several years of the published series, most sharply in 1921 (−10.5%) and 1931-32 during the Depression. Falling prices sound welcome but usually accompany a contracting economy, which is why central banks treat deflation as a problem rather than a goal.
Because it is. The BLS publishes CPI monthly, roughly mid-month for the month before, so a full-year average does not exist until the year ends. The current-year figure here is the plain average of the months published so far, and the calculator says how many that is rather than filling the gap with an estimate.
By comparing the compounded annual rate over your period to three published reference points: the Federal Reserve's 2% longer-run goal, the long-run CPI-U average of about 3.16%, and the 7.82% pace of the 1970-1980 Great Inflation. No threshold is invented — each is either a stated policy target or computed from the series shown on this page.