$100 in 1915 is worth $127 in 1917,
because prices increased 26.7% over that period, an average of
12.58% a year.
$100 in 1915 has
the same buying power as
$127
in 1917
Detailed inflation statistics
Cumulative price change
26.7%
Average inflation rate
12.58% per year
Converted amount ($100 base)
$127
Price difference ($100 base)
$26.73
CPI in 1915
10.1
CPI in 1917
12.8
Inflation in 1915
1.00%
Inflation in 1917
17.43%
$100 in 1915 → 1917
$127
$100 in 1917 → 1915
$78.91
What happened to prices between 1915 and 1917
Between 1915 and 1917, the Consumer Price Index went from 10.1 to 12.8.
Cumulatively, prices increased 26.7%, which works out to an average of
12.58% per year. Put differently, a dollar in 1915 bought what
$0.79 buys in 1917: the 1915 dollar
lost 21.1% of its purchasing power over
these 2 years.
Consumer prices rose 1.0% in 1915, the second straight year of near-flat
inflation before the wartime price surges of 1916 through 1918. The year’s
defining event had nothing to do with prices directly: a German submarine
sank the British liner Lusitania off the Irish coast on May 7, killing 128
Americans and hardening U.S. opinion against Germany two years before the
country entered the war. Economically, 1915 was a turning point of a
different kind. A recession that had dragged on since 1913 began lifting as
Britain and France placed growing orders for steel, munitions, and other war
materiel with American manufacturers, and U.S. exports to the Allied powers
climbed sharply through the year. That demand would keep building through
1916, eventually pulling prices up with it. On the regulatory
side, the Federal Trade Commission opened for business in March, taking on
enforcement of the Clayton Antitrust Act that Congress had passed the
previous fall. A first-class stamp still cost 2 cents, unchanged since 1885
and still two years from its first wartime increase.
Every 1915 amount converts to 1917 at the same ratio, 1.27: $1,000 becomes
$1,267, and $10,000 becomes $12,673.
Amount in 1915
Value in 1917
$1.00
$1.27
$5.00
$6.34
$10.00
$12.67
$20.00
$25.35
$50.00
$63.37
$100
$127
$500
$634
$1,000
$1,267
$5,000
$6,337
$10,000
$12,673
$100,000
$126,733
$1,000,000
$1,267,327
Inflation by spending category, 1915–1917
Between 1915 and 1917, food rose the most, up 45.0%, while apparel rose the least, up 32.0%, against 26.7% for all items. The headline number is an average; here is what $100 of 1915
spending costs in 1917, by category:
Category
Avg. yearly inflation
$100 in 1915 →
All items (CPI-U)
12.58%
$127
Food
20.42%
$145
Apparel
14.90%
$132
Not shown because the BLS began these indexes after 1915: core (all items less food & energy) (1957–), energy (1957–), housing (1967–), medical care (1935–), transportation (1935–), recreation (1993–), education & communication (1993–).
Year by year: CPI and the value of $100 from 1915
$100 from 1915 had already become $108 by
1916, on its way to $127 in 1917; each row shows the CPI, that
year's inflation rate, and the running value.
Within the span, inflation peaked at 17.4% in 1917, and the smallest rise was 7.9% in 1916.
In 1917, prices rose 17.4% and $100 from 1915 had the buying
power of $127; the year's average CPI of 12.8 is the level
behind every 1917 figure on this page.
1917 is when World War I inflation stopped being a background trend and
became the dominant fact of American economic life. Consumer prices rose
17.4% for the year, more than double the previous year’s already sharp
increase, as the country’s April 6 entry into the war layered federal war
spending on top of an economy already strained by military demand and
worker shortages. Congress paid for the war with the War Revenue Act that
October, which sharply raised income taxes, created a new tax on wartime
business profits, and, in a small but very visible change for ordinary
households, raised the cost of a first-class stamp from 2 cents to 3 cents
that November, the rate’s first move since 1885. Herbert Hoover took over
the new Food Administration in August and asked Americans to conserve food
voluntarily rather than face formal rationing, a campaign that became
famous enough that “Hooverize” entered the language as a verb for cutting
back. None of it slowed prices much: the 17.4% increase would be topped
again the very next year, in 1918.
MLA: “Inflation from 1915 to 1917: $100 is worth $127 today.” InflationCalculator.com, U.S. Bureau of Labor Statistics CPI-U data, https://inflationcalculator.com/inflation/1915-to-1917/
APA: InflationCalculator.com. Inflation from 1915 to 1917. Based on U.S. Bureau of Labor Statistics CPI-U data. Retrieved from https://inflationcalculator.com/inflation/1915-to-1917/