$100 in 1914 is worth $281 in 1957,
because prices increased 181.0% over that period, an average of
2.43% a year.
$100 in 1914 has
the same buying power as
$281
in 1957
Detailed inflation statistics
Cumulative price change
181.0%
Average inflation rate
2.43% per year
Converted amount ($100 base)
$281
Price difference ($100 base)
$181
CPI in 1914
10
CPI in 1957
28.1
Inflation in 1914
1.01%
Inflation in 1957
3.31%
$100 in 1914 → 1957
$281
$100 in 1957 → 1914
$35.59
What happened to prices between 1914 and 1957
Between 1914 and 1957, the Consumer Price Index went from 10 to 28.1.
Cumulatively, prices increased 181.0%, which works out to an average of
2.43% per year. Put differently, a dollar in 1914 bought what
$0.36 buys in 1957: the 1914 dollar
lost 64.4% of its purchasing power over
these 43 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 1957 at the same ratio, 2.81: $1,000 becomes
$2,810, and $10,000 becomes $28,100.
Amount in 1914
Value in 1957
$1.00
$2.81
$5.00
$14.05
$10.00
$28.10
$20.00
$56.20
$50.00
$141
$100
$281
$500
$1,405
$1,000
$2,810
$5,000
$14,050
$10,000
$28,100
$100,000
$281,000
$1,000,000
$2,810,000
Inflation by spending category, 1914–1957
Between 1914 and 1957, apparel rose the most, up 196.7%, while food rose the least, up 183.3%, against 181.0% for all items. The headline number is an average; here is what $100 of 1914
spending costs in 1957, by category:
Category
Avg. yearly inflation
$100 in 1914 →
All items (CPI-U)
2.43%
$281
Apparel
2.56%
$297
Food
2.45%
$283
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 1957
Prices climbed fastest in the 1910s, averaging 12.25% a year, and fell in the 1920s (1.8% a year). Each step below chains into the full 1914–1957 change:
Years
Avg. yearly inflation
Price change
$100 from 1914, at end
1914–1920
12.25%
100.0%
$200
1920–1930
-1.79%
-16.5%
$167
1930–1940
-1.75%
-16.2%
$140
1940–1950
5.58%
72.1%
$241
1950–1957
2.22%
16.6%
$281
Year by year: CPI and the value of $100 from 1914
$100 from 1914 had already become $139 by
1936, on its way to $281 in 1957; 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: 1957
In 1957, prices rose 3.3% and $100 from 1914 had the buying
power of $281; the year's average CPI of 28.1 is the level
behind every 1957 figure on this page.
Consumer prices rose 3.3% in 1957, up from 1956’s 1.5% and
the sharpest increase since the Korean War price surge of 1951. The jump
fed a growing debate among economists over “cost-push” inflation, prices
climbing from rising wages and material costs rather than excess demand,
a debate that would recur for the next quarter century. The Federal
Reserve tightened policy to fight it, and by August the tighter money
combined with falling business investment to tip the economy into a
recession, according to the National Bureau of Economic Research’s
dating. The Cold War took a technological turn that October, when the
Soviet Union launched Sputnik, the first artificial satellite, on the
4th, stunning the American public and setting off both the Space Race and
a surge in federal science and defense spending the following year. Civil
rights reached a crisis that September in Little Rock, Arkansas: after
Governor Orval Faubus used the National Guard to block nine Black
students from Central High School, Eisenhower federalized the Guard and
sent the 101st Airborne Division to enforce the Supreme Court’s
desegregation order. Consumer prices finished 1957 183.8% above their
1913 level. First-class postage held at 3 cents, and the
minimum wage stood at $1.00 an hour.
MLA: “Inflation from 1914 to 1957: $100 is worth $281 today.” InflationCalculator.com, U.S. Bureau of Labor Statistics CPI-U data, https://inflationcalculator.com/inflation/1914-to-1957/
APA: InflationCalculator.com. Inflation from 1914 to 1957. Based on U.S. Bureau of Labor Statistics CPI-U data. Retrieved from https://inflationcalculator.com/inflation/1914-to-1957/