$100 in 1914 is worth $2,927 in 2022,
because prices increased 2826.5% over that period, an average of
3.18% a year.
$100 in 1914 has
the same buying power as
$2,927
in 2022
Detailed inflation statistics
Cumulative price change
2826.5%
Average inflation rate
3.18% per year
Converted amount ($100 base)
$2,927
Price difference ($100 base)
$2,827
CPI in 1914
10
CPI in 2022
292.655
Inflation in 1914
1.01%
Inflation in 2022
8.00%
$100 in 1914 → 2022
$2,927
$100 in 2022 → 1914
$3.42
What happened to prices between 1914 and 2022
Between 1914 and 2022, the Consumer Price Index went from 10 to 292.655.
Cumulatively, prices increased 2826.5%, which works out to an average of
3.18% per year. Put differently, a dollar in 1914 bought what
$0.03 buys in 2022: the 1914 dollar
lost 96.6% of its purchasing power over
these 108 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 2022 at the same ratio, 29.27: $1,000 becomes
$29,265, and $10,000 becomes $292,655.
Amount in 1914
Value in 2022
$1.00
$29.27
$5.00
$146
$10.00
$293
$20.00
$585
$50.00
$1,463
$100
$2,927
$500
$14,633
$1,000
$29,265
$5,000
$146,327
$10,000
$292,655
$100,000
$2,926,550
$1,000,000
$29,265,500
Inflation by spending category, 1914–2022
Between 1914 and 2022, food rose the most, up 2894.0%, while apparel rose the least, up 747.2%, against 2826.5% for all items. The headline number is an average; here is what $100 of 1914
spending costs in 2022, by category:
Category
Avg. yearly inflation
$100 in 1914 →
All items (CPI-U)
3.18%
$2,927
Food
3.20%
$2,994
Apparel
2.00%
$847
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 2022
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 1914–2022 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
1990–2000
2.80%
31.8%
$1,722
2000–2010
2.39%
26.6%
$2,181
2010–2020
1.73%
18.7%
$2,588
2020–2022
6.34%
13.1%
$2,927
Year by year: CPI and the value of $100 from 1914
$100 from 1914 had already become $367 by
1969, on its way to $2,927 in 2022; 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: 2022
In 2022, prices rose 8.0% and $100 from 1914 had the buying
power of $2,927; the year's average CPI of 292.655 is the level
behind every 2022 figure on this page.
2022 was the year inflation returned. Consumer prices rose 8.0% on average,
the worst since 1981, driven by pandemic-era supply chains, stimulus-fueled
demand, and an energy shock from the war in Ukraine. Gas briefly topped $5 a
gallon nationally for the first time ever, and “inflation” became the
top-ranked economic concern in nearly every poll of American households.
MLA: “Inflation from 1914 to 2022: $100 is worth $2,927 today.” InflationCalculator.com, U.S. Bureau of Labor Statistics CPI-U data, https://inflationcalculator.com/inflation/1914-to-2022/
APA: InflationCalculator.com. Inflation from 1914 to 2022. Based on U.S. Bureau of Labor Statistics CPI-U data. Retrieved from https://inflationcalculator.com/inflation/1914-to-2022/