A long term inflation picture

The charts are fairly self explanatory, and simply show the actual prices plus show two additional lines; one for the price corrected by CPI and the other corrected by CPPI.

Thanks to John Williams of Shadow Stats for his excellent work on the CPI lies, but also note that we are not using his full adjustments (as of 1/2007, his "CPI" level was around 500 where ours was around 340... and the pre Clinton methodology CPI was about 275... and the actual BLS CPI-U was 202). This page updated on an irregular basis, approximately monthly.

As of August 2007, we changed the basis to the year 2000 on all charts to avoid issues of clarity due to having had two scales.

Per the CPI-U alone, inflation has averaged 4.5% per year since 1963 and 4.7% since 1970 as of 2006 - for reference. That's a total of about 600% and 500%, respectively.

See the same charts and data, but log scaled on this page.

Dow U.S. household net worth U.S. individual net worth Hourly earnings Minimum wage U.S. housing Corn Wheat Gold
Silver CRB commodity index Copper Oil Retail sales Non durable goods US gov't receipts US gov't spending PCE CRB livestock CRB foodstuff Sugar Dow, total return
Employment cost index Federal, state & local debt Median family income Cotton Cocoa

Dow stock index

Almost 90% of the Dow's gain since 1963 is inflation.



Same, but going back to 1900

Over 80% of the Dow's gain since 1900 is inflation.



Click here for a similar picture since 1963 for the S&P 500





Dow stock index, total return including dividends


The average compounded total return per year 1900 through 2009 is about 6.1%. When corrected by CPI, it's about 2.9%... and with full with CPPI corrections included, its about 2.0%. In other words, over 66% or 2/3 of the total return is inflation only... and that's before fees, commissions and taxes.







U.S. median new home prices









Corn








Wheat






Gold










Silver






Copper






US Federal government spending






US Federal government receipts (taxes)






Personal consumption & expenditures (PCE)



Expenditures only






Total U.S. Household net worth


Source: Z1 publication




U.S. individual net worth


Derived from above chart by dividing by average individuals per household.





CRB commodity index


Source: CRB





Oil







U.S. retail sales


Source





U.S. non durable goods


Source





CRB Livestock Index


Source





CRB Foodstuff Index


Source





Sugar


Source





Cattle


Source





Employment cost index


Source





Hourly earnings





Source





Minimum wage


Source





Cotton







Federal, state & local debt







Median & mean family income








Cocoa


Source





Coffee


Source