$100 in 1913 is worth $275 in 1956,
because prices increased 174.7% over that period, an average of
2.38% a year.
$100 in 1913 has
the same buying power as
$275
in 1956
Detailed inflation statistics
Cumulative price change
174.7%
Average inflation rate
2.38% per year
Converted amount ($100 base)
$275
Price difference ($100 base)
$175
CPI in 1913
9.9
CPI in 1956
27.2
Inflation in 1913
n/a
Inflation in 1956
1.49%
$100 in 1913 → 1956
$275
$100 in 1956 → 1913
$36.40
What happened to prices between 1913 and 1956
Between 1913 and 1956, the Consumer Price Index went from 9.9 to 27.2.
Cumulatively, prices increased 174.7%, which works out to an average of
2.38% per year. Put differently, a dollar in 1913 bought what
$0.36 buys in 1956: the 1913 dollar
lost 63.6% of its purchasing power over
these 43 years.
1913 is where this site’s price history begins, because it’s where the Bureau of Labor
Statistics’ own consumer price data begins. The CPI wasn’t published in real time back then;
the BLS built the earliest index retroactively from retail price records collected starting
in 1913, which makes every dollar figure on this site ultimately anchored to that year’s
prices. It was also the year the machinery of modern federal economic policy was built. The
16th Amendment, ratified in February, cleared the constitutional path for a federal income
tax, and the Revenue Act that followed in October imposed a top rate of just 7% on income
above $500,000, a narrow tax that would later be reshaped into the broad-based system that
funds the government today. In December, Congress passed the Federal Reserve Act, creating
the central bank that would eventually take on fighting inflation as one of its core jobs,
including the 19%-plus interest rates it deployed against the 1970s and early 1980s
price surge. Consumer life in 1913 was correspondingly simple by later
standards: a first-class stamp cost 2 cents, a price that held from 1885 all the way to
1917, and the Ford Motor Company introduced the moving assembly line at its Highland Park
plant that year, a manufacturing breakthrough that would spend the next decade driving down
the cost of a car faster than prices elsewhere were rising.
Every 1913 amount converts to 1956 at the same ratio, 2.75: $1,000 becomes
$2,747, and $10,000 becomes $27,475.
Amount in 1913
Value in 1956
$1.00
$2.75
$5.00
$13.74
$10.00
$27.47
$20.00
$54.95
$50.00
$137
$100
$275
$500
$1,374
$1,000
$2,747
$5,000
$13,737
$10,000
$27,475
$100,000
$274,747
$1,000,000
$2,747,475
Inflation by spending category, 1913–1956
The headline number is an average; here is what $100 of 1913
spending costs in 1956, by category:
Category
Avg. yearly inflation
$100 in 1913 →
All items (CPI-U)
2.38%
$275
Food
2.42%
$280
Not shown because the BLS began these indexes after 1913: core (all items less food & energy) (1957–), energy (1957–), housing (1967–), medical care (1935–), apparel (1914–), transportation (1935–), recreation (1993–), education & communication (1993–).
Decade by decade: 1913 to 1956
Prices climbed fastest in the 1910s, averaging 10.57% a year, and fell in the 1920s (1.8% a year). Each step below chains into the full 1913–1956 change:
Years
Avg. yearly inflation
Price change
$100 from 1913, at end
1913–1920
10.57%
102.0%
$202
1920–1930
-1.79%
-16.5%
$169
1930–1940
-1.75%
-16.2%
$141
1940–1950
5.58%
72.1%
$243
1950–1956
2.04%
12.9%
$275
Year by year: CPI and the value of $100 from 1913
$100 from 1913 had already become $138 by
1935, on its way to $275 in 1956; each row shows the CPI, that
year's inflation rate, and the running value.
Within the span, inflation peaked at 18.0% in 1918, and prices fell 10.5% in 1921, the deepest deflation of the period.
Long periods are sampled every 2 years; the calculator above covers any pair of years.
The destination year: 1956
In 1956, prices rose 1.5% and $100 from 1913 had the buying
power of $275; the year's average CPI of 27.2 is the level
behind every 1956 figure on this page.
Consumer prices rose 1.5% in 1956, a return to mild inflation after they had
fallen 0.4% in 1955, the only annual decline of the decade. The two years sat
in the calmest stretch of the postwar index, a lull between the Korean War
price surge earlier in the 1950s and the acceleration that would return in
the 1970s. Congress had already raised the wage floor into that calm: the
Fair Labor Standards Amendments of 1955, signed the previous August, took
effect March 1 and lifted the federal minimum wage from 75 cents to $1 an
hour, the first increase since 1950. Eisenhower signed a longer-lasting
commitment on June 29, the Federal-Aid Highway Act, funding 41,000 miles of
controlled-access highway at 90% federal cost to build the Interstate
System, the largest public-works program the country had undertaken. He won
a second term that November, carrying 41 states and about 57% of the
popular vote in a rematch against Adlai Stevenson. Abroad, the Suez Crisis
broke the calm on the supply side: Egypt nationalized the canal on July 26,
and after Israel invaded the Sinai on October 29 with British and French
forces following, the canal’s closure and damaged pipelines squeezed oil
shipments to Western Europe for months. Consumer prices stood 174.7% above
their 1913 level by 1956, up 94% since 1940
alone, even after a decade that had barely moved the index. First-class
postage held at 3 cents, unchanged since 1932.
MLA: “Inflation from 1913 to 1956: $100 is worth $275 today.” InflationCalculator.com, U.S. Bureau of Labor Statistics CPI-U data, https://inflationcalculator.com/inflation/1913-to-1956/
APA: InflationCalculator.com. Inflation from 1913 to 1956. Based on U.S. Bureau of Labor Statistics CPI-U data. Retrieved from https://inflationcalculator.com/inflation/1913-to-1956/