$100 in 1913 is worth $448 in 1973,
because prices increased 348.5% over that period, an average of
2.53% a year.
$100 in 1913 has
the same buying power as
$448
in 1973
Detailed inflation statistics
Cumulative price change
348.5%
Average inflation rate
2.53% per year
Converted amount ($100 base)
$448
Price difference ($100 base)
$348
CPI in 1913
9.9
CPI in 1973
44.4
Inflation in 1913
n/a
Inflation in 1973
6.22%
$100 in 1913 → 1973
$448
$100 in 1973 → 1913
$22.30
What happened to prices between 1913 and 1973
Between 1913 and 1973, the Consumer Price Index went from 9.9 to 44.4.
Cumulatively, prices increased 348.5%, which works out to an average of
2.53% per year. Put differently, a dollar in 1913 bought what
$0.22 buys in 1973: the 1913 dollar
lost 77.7% of its purchasing power over
these 60 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 1973 at the same ratio, 4.48: $1,000 becomes
$4,485, and $10,000 becomes $44,848.
Amount in 1913
Value in 1973
$1.00
$4.48
$5.00
$22.42
$10.00
$44.85
$20.00
$89.70
$50.00
$224
$100
$448
$500
$2,242
$1,000
$4,485
$5,000
$22,424
$10,000
$44,848
$100,000
$448,485
$1,000,000
$4,484,848
Inflation by spending category, 1913–1973
The headline number is an average; here is what $100 of 1913
spending costs in 1973, by category:
Category
Avg. yearly inflation
$100 in 1913 →
All items (CPI-U)
2.53%
$448
Food
2.66%
$482
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 1973
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 1913–1973 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
1950–1960
2.08%
22.8%
$299
1960–1970
2.74%
31.1%
$392
1970–1973
4.60%
14.4%
$448
Year by year: CPI and the value of $100 from 1913
$100 from 1913 had already become $175 by
1943, on its way to $448 in 1973; 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: 1973
In 1973, prices rose 6.2% and $100 from 1913 had the buying
power of $448; the year's average CPI of 44.4 is the level
behind every 1973 figure on this page.
Consumer prices rose 6.2% in 1973, nearly double 1972’s 3.2%,
as Nixon’s wage and price controls were phased out through the year and
pressure the controls had been holding back broke loose. The bigger shock
arrived that October, when Arab oil-producing states embargoed exports to the
United States and other supporters of Israel in the Yom Kippur War. Crude
oil, which had traded around $3 a barrel, approached $12 by early 1974, and
gas lines became a fixture outside filling stations nationwide. Earlier in
the year, the Paris Peace Accords, signed that January 27, ended direct
American combat in Vietnam and set a 60-day deadline for withdrawing
remaining U.S. troops, even as fighting between North and South Vietnam went
on. Financial markets read the year correctly as a turning point: the Dow
Jones Industrial Average peaked at 1,051.70 on January 11, a level it would
not reach again until 1980, before the oil shock and rising interest rates
dragged it into a two-year bear market. A median household earned $10,512 in
1973, a new home sold for a median $32,500, and gas averaged 38.5 cents a
gallon, still under half of what the embargo’s effects would bring the
following year. Consumer prices stood 348.5% above their
1913 level by year’s end, with the decade’s worst inflation
still ahead.
MLA: “Inflation from 1913 to 1973: $100 is worth $448 today.” InflationCalculator.com, U.S. Bureau of Labor Statistics CPI-U data, https://inflationcalculator.com/inflation/1913-to-1973/
APA: InflationCalculator.com. Inflation from 1913 to 1973. Based on U.S. Bureau of Labor Statistics CPI-U data. Retrieved from https://inflationcalculator.com/inflation/1913-to-1973/