$100 in 1914 is worth $175 in 1925,
because prices increased 75.0% over that period, an average of
5.22% a year.
$100 in 1914 has
the same buying power as
$175
in 1925
Detailed inflation statistics
Cumulative price change
75.0%
Average inflation rate
5.22% per year
Converted amount ($100 base)
$175
Price difference ($100 base)
$75.00
CPI in 1914
10
CPI in 1925
17.5
Inflation in 1914
1.01%
Inflation in 1925
2.34%
$100 in 1914 → 1925
$175
$100 in 1925 → 1914
$57.14
What happened to prices between 1914 and 1925
Between 1914 and 1925, the Consumer Price Index went from 10 to 17.5.
Cumulatively, prices increased 75.0%, which works out to an average of
5.22% per year. Put differently, a dollar in 1914 bought what
$0.57 buys in 1925: the 1914 dollar
lost 42.9% of its purchasing power over
these 11 years.
Consumer prices barely moved in 1914, rising just 1.0% for the year, even as
the country’s financial plumbing was rebuilt from the ground up. The Federal
Reserve Banks, created by the Federal Reserve Act signed the previous
December, opened their doors on November 16, giving the U.S. a central bank
for the first time since the 1830s. Weeks earlier, the outbreak of war in
Europe had spooked the New York Stock Exchange into closing for more than
four months, the longest shutdown in its history, as officials worried
European investors would dump American securities for gold. Domestically, the
bigger story was labor: Henry Ford’s decision to pay factory workers $5 a
day, announced in January, roughly doubled wages on his assembly lines and
pushed other manufacturers to raise pay just to keep workers from leaving. A
first-class stamp still cost 2 cents, a price that had held since 1885 and
would keep holding for three more years, even as the war reshaping Europe
began pulling the American economy toward the sustained wartime inflation of
1917.
Every 1914 amount converts to 1925 at the same ratio, 1.75: $1,000 becomes
$1,750, and $10,000 becomes $17,500.
Amount in 1914
Value in 1925
$1.00
$1.75
$5.00
$8.75
$10.00
$17.50
$20.00
$35.00
$50.00
$87.50
$100
$175
$500
$875
$1,000
$1,750
$5,000
$8,750
$10,000
$17,500
$100,000
$175,000
$1,000,000
$1,750,000
Inflation by spending category, 1914–1925
Between 1914 and 1925, apparel rose the most, up 75.3%, while food rose the least, up 61.8%, against 75.0% for all items. The headline number is an average; here is what $100 of 1914
spending costs in 1925, by category:
Category
Avg. yearly inflation
$100 in 1914 →
All items (CPI-U)
5.22%
$175
Apparel
5.24%
$175
Food
4.47%
$162
Not shown because the BLS began these indexes after 1914: core (all items less food & energy) (1957–), energy (1957–), housing (1967–), medical care (1935–), transportation (1935–), recreation (1993–), education & communication (1993–).
Decade by decade: 1914 to 1925
Prices climbed fastest in the 1910s, averaging 12.25% a year, and fell in the 1920s (2.6% a year). Each step below chains into the full 1914–1925 change:
Years
Avg. yearly inflation
Price change
$100 from 1914, at end
1914–1920
12.25%
100.0%
$200
1920–1925
-2.64%
-12.5%
$175
Year by year: CPI and the value of $100 from 1914
$100 from 1914 had already become $173 by
1919, on its way to $175 in 1925; 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.
In 1925, prices rose 2.3% and $100 from 1914 had the buying
power of $175; the year's average CPI of 17.5 is the level
behind every 1925 figure on this page.
Consumer prices rose 2.3% in 1925, the CPI’s largest single-year increase
since the deflationary swings of the early 1920s, though still mild next to
the double-digit inflation of the World War I years. The country’s cultural
fault lines were on full display that summer in Dayton, Tennessee, where
high school teacher John Scopes was tried July 10-21 for violating a state
law against teaching evolution, a case that drew national press coverage and
pitted prosecutor William Jennings Bryan against defense attorney Clarence
Darrow. Real estate speculation, meanwhile, peaked in Florida, where buyers
flipped undeveloped land in the Miami area on thin down payments, driving
prices far above what the land itself could support; the bubble would
collapse the following year. Detroit reshuffled that June too: Walter
Chrysler reorganized the struggling Maxwell Motor Company into Chrysler
Corporation, the start of what would become one of the American auto
industry’s “Big Three.” First-class postage held at 2 cents for the sixth
straight year.
MLA: “Inflation from 1914 to 1925: $100 is worth $175 today.” InflationCalculator.com, U.S. Bureau of Labor Statistics CPI-U data, https://inflationcalculator.com/inflation/1914-to-1925/
APA: InflationCalculator.com. Inflation from 1914 to 1925. Based on U.S. Bureau of Labor Statistics CPI-U data. Retrieved from https://inflationcalculator.com/inflation/1914-to-1925/