$100 in 1914 is worth $348 in 1968,
because prices increased 248.0% over that period, an average of
2.34% a year.
$100 in 1914 has
the same buying power as
$348
in 1968
Detailed inflation statistics
Cumulative price change
248.0%
Average inflation rate
2.34% per year
Converted amount ($100 base)
$348
Price difference ($100 base)
$248
CPI in 1914
10
CPI in 1968
34.8
Inflation in 1914
1.01%
Inflation in 1968
4.19%
$100 in 1914 → 1968
$348
$100 in 1968 → 1914
$28.74
What happened to prices between 1914 and 1968
Between 1914 and 1968, the Consumer Price Index went from 10 to 34.8.
Cumulatively, prices increased 248.0%, which works out to an average of
2.34% per year. Put differently, a dollar in 1914 bought what
$0.29 buys in 1968: the 1914 dollar
lost 71.3% of its purchasing power over
these 54 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 1968 at the same ratio, 3.48: $1,000 becomes
$3,480, and $10,000 becomes $34,800.
Amount in 1914
Value in 1968
$1.00
$3.48
$5.00
$17.40
$10.00
$34.80
$20.00
$69.60
$50.00
$174
$100
$348
$500
$1,740
$1,000
$3,480
$5,000
$17,400
$10,000
$34,800
$100,000
$348,000
$1,000,000
$3,480,000
Inflation by spending category, 1914–1968
Between 1914 and 1968, apparel rose the most, up 258.0%, while food rose the least, up 246.1%, against 248.0% for all items. The headline number is an average; here is what $100 of 1914
spending costs in 1968, by category:
Category
Avg. yearly inflation
$100 in 1914 →
All items (CPI-U)
2.34%
$348
Apparel
2.39%
$358
Food
2.33%
$346
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 1968
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 1914–1968 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
1950–1960
2.08%
22.8%
$296
1960–1968
2.04%
17.6%
$348
Year by year: CPI and the value of $100 from 1914
$100 from 1914 had already become $140 by
1940, on its way to $348 in 1968; 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: 1968
In 1968, prices rose 4.2% and $100 from 1914 had the buying
power of $348; the year's average CPI of 34.8 is the level
behind every 1968 figure on this page.
Consumer prices rose 4.2% in 1968, up sharply from 1967’s
3.1% and the fastest pace in 17 years, as Vietnam War spending and a tight
labor market pushed inflation higher despite the Federal Reserve’s
earlier tightening. The year was marked by political violence: Martin
Luther King Jr. was assassinated on a motel balcony in Memphis on April
4, touching off rioting in more than 100 cities, and Robert F. Kennedy was
shot in Los Angeles on June 5, moments after winning California’s
Democratic presidential primary, and died the next day. Washington tried
to answer the inflation problem directly that June 28, when Congress
passed a 10% income tax surcharge, the Revenue and Expenditure Control
Act, temporarily raising taxes and cutting spending to cool an economy
overheated by war and Great Society outlays; prices kept accelerating
anyway. The cost of living rose in smaller, more visible ways too:
first-class postage climbed to 6 cents that January 7, and the minimum
wage rose to $1.60 an hour that February 1, the final step of the
increase Congress had set two years earlier. Consumer prices finished
1968 251.5% above their 1913 level.
MLA: “Inflation from 1914 to 1968: $100 is worth $348 today.” InflationCalculator.com, U.S. Bureau of Labor Statistics CPI-U data, https://inflationcalculator.com/inflation/1914-to-1968/
APA: InflationCalculator.com. Inflation from 1914 to 1968. Based on U.S. Bureau of Labor Statistics CPI-U data. Retrieved from https://inflationcalculator.com/inflation/1914-to-1968/