$100 in 1914 is worth $1,524 in 1995,
because prices increased 1424.0% over that period, an average of
3.42% a year.
$100 in 1914 has
the same buying power as
$1,524
in 1995
Detailed inflation statistics
Cumulative price change
1424.0%
Average inflation rate
3.42% per year
Converted amount ($100 base)
$1,524
Price difference ($100 base)
$1,424
CPI in 1914
10
CPI in 1995
152.4
Inflation in 1914
1.01%
Inflation in 1995
2.83%
$100 in 1914 → 1995
$1,524
$100 in 1995 → 1914
$6.56
What happened to prices between 1914 and 1995
Between 1914 and 1995, the Consumer Price Index went from 10 to 152.4.
Cumulatively, prices increased 1424.0%, which works out to an average of
3.42% per year. Put differently, a dollar in 1914 bought what
$0.07 buys in 1995: the 1914 dollar
lost 93.4% of its purchasing power over
these 81 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 1995 at the same ratio, 15.24: $1,000 becomes
$15,240, and $10,000 becomes $152,400.
Amount in 1914
Value in 1995
$1.00
$15.24
$5.00
$76.20
$10.00
$152
$20.00
$305
$50.00
$762
$100
$1,524
$500
$7,620
$1,000
$15,240
$5,000
$76,200
$10,000
$152,400
$100,000
$1,524,000
$1,000,000
$15,240,000
Inflation by spending category, 1914–1995
Between 1914 and 1995, food rose the most, up 1354.9%, while apparel rose the least, up 780.0%, against 1424.0% for all items. The headline number is an average; here is what $100 of 1914
spending costs in 1995, by category:
Category
Avg. yearly inflation
$100 in 1914 →
All items (CPI-U)
3.42%
$1,524
Food
3.36%
$1,455
Apparel
2.72%
$880
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 1995
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 1914–1995 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
1960–1970
2.74%
31.1%
$388
1970–1980
7.82%
112.4%
$824
1980–1990
4.72%
58.6%
$1,307
1990–1995
3.12%
16.6%
$1,524
Year by year: CPI and the value of $100 from 1914
$100 from 1914 had already become $269 by
1954, on its way to $1,524 in 1995; 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 5 years; the calculator above covers any pair of years.
The destination year: 1995
In 1995, prices rose 2.8% and $100 from 1914 had the buying
power of $1,524; the year's average CPI of 152.4 is the level
behind every 1995 figure on this page.
In 1995, gas averaged $1.15 a gallon, a new home cost roughly $133,900, and the median household
earned about $34,100. Inflation ran at 2.8% for the year, little changed from 1994, as the
Federal Reserve shifted from raising rates to cutting them. Having lifted its policy rate six
times the year before, the Fed judged by July that the economy had cooled enough on its own, and
trimmed rates instead, an outcome economists would later point to as a rare soft landing. The
year opened with a currency crisis: Mexico’s peso lost roughly half its value against the dollar
in a matter of weeks, and the U.S. Treasury and the IMF assembled a $50 billion rescue package,
controversial in Congress, to stabilize it and keep the crisis from spreading to other emerging
markets. Closer to home, a budget standoff between President Clinton and the Republican Congress
shut down federal agencies twice, first for five days in November and then for 21 days spanning
December into January 1996, the longest shutdown up to that point. The Postal Service raised the
cost of a first-class stamp to 32 cents in January. Low, steady inflation was about the only calm
part of 1995’s economic story.
MLA: “Inflation from 1914 to 1995: $100 is worth $1,524 today.” InflationCalculator.com, U.S. Bureau of Labor Statistics CPI-U data, https://inflationcalculator.com/inflation/1914-to-1995/
APA: InflationCalculator.com. Inflation from 1914 to 1995. Based on U.S. Bureau of Labor Statistics CPI-U data. Retrieved from https://inflationcalculator.com/inflation/1914-to-1995/