What America was like in 1986
You were born in…
1986
This is where your story begins.
You’ve been here for
40
years
That’s about 14,600 days of history.
A first-class stamp in 1986 cost
22¢
Today the same stamp costs 82¢.
A dollar from 1986 would be worth
$3.07
today
Measured by the government’s Consumer Price Index.
The federal minimum wage in 1986 was
$3.35
an hour
Today it’s $7.25.
The president in 1986
Ronald Reagan
Since then you’ve lived under 7 presidents.
The 1990 census counted
249 million
Americans
By 2020 there were 331 million of us.
You’ve been around for
40
Super Bowls
From Super Bowl XXI in 1987 to Super Bowl LX in 2026.
You’re older than…
- The World Wide Web opened to the public1991. You were 5.
- Amazon sold its first book1995. You were 9.
- Google was founded1998. You were 12.
- Facebook launched2004. You were 18.
- The iPhone went on sale2007. You were 21.
- The iPad went on sale2010. You were 24.
So yes,
you’ve seen the worldchange a lot.
And you remember it.
Your 1986 story
That was 1986.
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Where these numbers come from
- U.S. Bureau of Labor Statistics, CPI for All Urban Consumers (CPI-U), U.S. city average, all items, 1982-84=100
- U.S. Postal Service, Rates for Domestic Letters Since 1863
- U.S. Department of Labor, history of federal minimum wage rates
- U.S. Census Bureau, decennial census resident population
- Presidents and milestones: widely documented public records.