$100 in 1915 is worth $299 in 1962,
because prices increased 199.0% over that period, an average of
2.36% a year.
$100 in 1915 has
the same buying power as
$299
in 1962
Detailed inflation statistics
Cumulative price change
199.0%
Average inflation rate
2.36% per year
Converted amount ($100 base)
$299
Price difference ($100 base)
$199
CPI in 1915
10.1
CPI in 1962
30.2
Inflation in 1915
1.00%
Inflation in 1962
1.00%
$100 in 1915 → 1962
$299
$100 in 1962 → 1915
$33.44
What happened to prices between 1915 and 1962
Between 1915 and 1962, the Consumer Price Index went from 10.1 to 30.2.
Cumulatively, prices increased 199.0%, which works out to an average of
2.36% per year. Put differently, a dollar in 1915 bought what
$0.33 buys in 1962: the 1915 dollar
lost 66.6% of its purchasing power over
these 47 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 1962 at the same ratio, 2.99: $1,000 becomes
$2,990, and $10,000 becomes $29,901.
Amount in 1915
Value in 1962
$1.00
$2.99
$5.00
$14.95
$10.00
$29.90
$20.00
$59.80
$50.00
$150
$100
$299
$500
$1,495
$1,000
$2,990
$5,000
$14,950
$10,000
$29,901
$100,000
$299,010
$1,000,000
$2,990,099
Inflation by spending category, 1915–1962
Between 1915 and 1962, food rose the most, up 206.0%, while apparel rose the least, up 202.6%, against 199.0% for all items. The headline number is an average; here is what $100 of 1915
spending costs in 1962, by category:
Category
Avg. yearly inflation
$100 in 1915 →
All items (CPI-U)
2.36%
$299
Food
2.41%
$306
Apparel
2.38%
$303
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–).
Decade by decade: 1915 to 1962
Prices climbed fastest in the 1910s, averaging 14.64% a year, and fell in the 1920s (1.8% a year). Each step below chains into the full 1915–1962 change:
Years
Avg. yearly inflation
Price change
$100 from 1915, at end
1915–1920
14.64%
98.0%
$198
1920–1930
-1.79%
-16.5%
$165
1930–1940
-1.75%
-16.2%
$139
1940–1950
5.58%
72.1%
$239
1950–1960
2.08%
22.8%
$293
1960–1962
1.01%
2.0%
$299
Year by year: CPI and the value of $100 from 1915
$100 from 1915 had already become $138 by
1939, on its way to $299 in 1962; 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: 1962
In 1962, prices rose 1.0% and $100 from 1915 had the buying
power of $299; the year's average CPI of 30.2 is the level
behind every 1962 figure on this page.
Consumer prices rose 1.0% in 1962, matching 1961’s pace as
inflation stayed remarkably low and unemployment slowly declined from its
recession-era highs. That January, Kennedy’s Council of Economic Advisers
introduced “wage-price guideposts,” non-binding targets meant to keep pay
and price increases in line with productivity growth without formal
controls. The space race delivered a milestone that February, when John
Glenn’s Friendship 7 capsule circled Earth three times, making him the
first American to orbit the planet. Markets got a scare that spring: a
dispute over U.S. Steel’s April price increase, which Kennedy publicly
pressured the company into rolling back, rattled investors, and the Dow
Jones Industrial Average fell about 5.7% on May 28, its steepest one-day
drop since the 1929 crash. The year’s gravest moment came that October,
when American reconnaissance photographed Soviet nuclear missiles in
Cuba, setting off a 13-day standoff that brought the two superpowers
closer to nuclear war than at any other point in the Cold War before the
Soviet Union agreed to remove the missiles in exchange for a U.S. pledge
not to invade the island. Consumer prices finished 1962 205.1% above their
1913 level. First-class postage held at 4 cents, and the
minimum wage stayed at $1.15 an hour.
MLA: “Inflation from 1915 to 1962: $100 is worth $299 today.” InflationCalculator.com, U.S. Bureau of Labor Statistics CPI-U data, https://inflationcalculator.com/inflation/1915-to-1962/
APA: InflationCalculator.com. Inflation from 1915 to 1962. Based on U.S. Bureau of Labor Statistics CPI-U data. Retrieved from https://inflationcalculator.com/inflation/1915-to-1962/