Orig. Price Sticker for 1989 Squarestream

[Mainstream]

Here is the Original Price sticker for my 1989 33 Ft. Squarestream.
Click on it to enlarge. The List was $32,578 in 1989.
Well, I did a Google search to see what the value of that amount would be in todays dollar and to my suprise it is only about $58,300. Something wrong here! If that is true a Loaded new 33 foot Airstream should list for about $58,000.. FAT CHANCE.
Whats wrong with this picture???? Any ideas?

[Mainstream]

I failed to mention that you can click on the Price Sticker and it will enlarge so it can be read.

[vswingfield]

There is a good discussion of inflation adjustment at Duke University's website. This is the extremely simplified version.

Pay particular attention to paragraph 3 which begins with "Use of the "correct" price index is important if you are interested in knowing the exact magnitudes of trends in real terms..."

Online calculators are OK for general guesstimates of inflation, but are not suitable for something as esoteric as Airstream values. There are specific deflators for certain things, but they are more slanted to broad categories, such as food or housing. This, in a way, is like asking how much a vintage Airstream is worth. Difficult.

More detailed information can be found at the Bureau of Economic Analysis (BEA, part of the US Department of Commerce—search for deflator). If you find this interesting, you should work where I do.