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Inflation & Purchasing Power Calculator

See how an assumed inflation rate changes future costs and the buying power of an unchanged cash balance.

Your assumptions

Formatting only, not an exchange-rate conversion. Use the same currency for every amount.

The amount already saved or invested.

A projection horizon, not a prediction of your lifespan.

Your assumed yearly change in prices, not a country-specific forecast.

These calculator inputs stay in this page and are not saved or sent to an application API. They do not change your Canadian planner inputs or saved profiles.

Your illustration

The chart compares future nominal cost with the buying power, in today's money, of unchanged cash. These are different measures, not two investment returns.

Future equivalent cost
CAD 16,386
Cash buying power then
CAD 6,103
Cumulative price change
63.9%

A constant-inflation scenario, not historical CPI data. No interest is earned on the unchanged cash balance.

Year-by-year projection (CAD)
Projection from year 0 to year 20. Exact values are available in the year-by-year table below.08.8K17.7KYear 0Year 20
Future costBuying power of unchanged cash
View year-by-year table
Illustrative year-end values in CAD. Displayed amounts are rounded.
YearFuture costBuying power of unchanged cash
0CAD 10,000CAD 10,000
1CAD 10,250CAD 9,756
2CAD 10,506CAD 9,518
3CAD 10,769CAD 9,286
4CAD 11,038CAD 9,060
5CAD 11,314CAD 8,839
6CAD 11,597CAD 8,623
7CAD 11,887CAD 8,413
8CAD 12,184CAD 8,207
9CAD 12,489CAD 8,007
10CAD 12,801CAD 7,812
11CAD 13,121CAD 7,621
12CAD 13,449CAD 7,436
13CAD 13,785CAD 7,254
14CAD 14,130CAD 7,077
15CAD 14,483CAD 6,905
16CAD 14,845CAD 6,736
17CAD 15,216CAD 6,572
18CAD 15,597CAD 6,412
19CAD 15,987CAD 6,255
20CAD 16,386CAD 6,103

Educational estimates, not financial advice. Actual returns and inflation vary. Taxes, government benefits, currency movements and market volatility are not modeled. No result guarantees retirement income.

How this calculator works

We compound your assumed inflation rate to estimate the future price of today's purchase. Separately, we divide an unchanged cash amount by that factor to estimate its future buying power in today's money. Negative inflation is allowed.

Future cost = today's cost x (1 + inflation)^years. Buying power of unchanged cash = cash / (1 + inflation)^years.

Example: At 2.5% inflation, something costing 10,000 today would cost about 12,800.85 in 10 years. An unchanged 10,000 cash balance would then have about 7,811.98 of today's buying power.

Change the examples to reflect your situation and test less favorable assumptions. These simplified formulas exclude country-specific taxes and benefits. Constant investment returns do not capture market volatility or the order in which gains and losses occur.

Common questions

Is this a historical inflation calculator?

No. It projects a user-selected constant rate, without using a country's historical consumer price index or live inflation data.

Does changing currency change the inflation rate?

No. Currency selection only changes formatting. Set an inflation assumption appropriate to your spending; no exchange rates or country-specific economic forecasts are applied.

Background & references

These references explain the underlying concepts. The formulas and timing described above define this tool; no country-specific rules are imported from the references.

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