$100 in 1915 is worth $1,228 in 1989,
because prices increased 1127.7% over that period, an average of
3.45% a year.
$100 in 1915 has
the same buying power as
$1,228
in 1989
Detailed inflation statistics
Cumulative price change
1127.7%
Average inflation rate
3.45% per year
Converted amount ($100 base)
$1,228
Price difference ($100 base)
$1,128
CPI in 1915
10.1
CPI in 1989
124
Inflation in 1915
1.00%
Inflation in 1989
4.82%
$100 in 1915 → 1989
$1,228
$100 in 1989 → 1915
$8.15
What happened to prices between 1915 and 1989
Between 1915 and 1989, the Consumer Price Index went from 10.1 to 124.
Cumulatively, prices increased 1127.7%, which works out to an average of
3.45% per year. Put differently, a dollar in 1915 bought what
$0.08 buys in 1989: the 1915 dollar
lost 91.9% of its purchasing power over
these 74 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 1989 at the same ratio, 12.28: $1,000 becomes
$12,277, and $10,000 becomes $122,772.
Amount in 1915
Value in 1989
$1.00
$12.28
$5.00
$61.39
$10.00
$123
$20.00
$246
$50.00
$614
$100
$1,228
$500
$6,139
$1,000
$12,277
$5,000
$61,386
$10,000
$122,772
$100,000
$1,227,723
$1,000,000
$12,277,228
Inflation by spending category, 1915–1989
Between 1915 and 1989, food rose the most, up 1151.0%, while apparel rose the least, up 675.2%, against 1127.7% for all items. The headline number is an average; here is what $100 of 1915
spending costs in 1989, by category:
Category
Avg. yearly inflation
$100 in 1915 →
All items (CPI-U)
3.45%
$1,228
Food
3.47%
$1,251
Apparel
2.81%
$775
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 1989
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 1915–1989 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
1960–1970
2.74%
31.1%
$384
1970–1980
7.82%
112.4%
$816
1980–1989
4.65%
50.5%
$1,228
Year by year: CPI and the value of $100 from 1915
$100 from 1915 had already become $239 by
1950, on its way to $1,228 in 1989; 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: 1989
In 1989, prices rose 4.8% and $100 from 1915 had the buying
power of $1,228; the year's average CPI of 124 is the level
behind every 1989 figure on this page.
1989 closed out a decade that began in economic crisis and ended in a long,
calmer expansion. Inflation for the year came in at 4.8%, higher than the
mid-decade lull but still roughly a third of the 13.5% peak that had opened
the decade in 1980. The federal minimum wage, unchanged at $3.35 an hour
since January 1981, had gone longer without an increase than at any point
since Congress created it, and had lost close to a third of its purchasing
power to inflation in the meantime; lawmakers would finally raise it to
$3.80 the following April. The decade’s other unfinished business came due
in August, when Congress passed FIRREA, the law that created the Resolution
Trust Corporation to seize and sell off the hundreds of savings and loan
institutions that a decade of deregulation and risky lending had left
insolvent, a bailout that eventually cost taxpayers over $100 billion. On
Wall Street, the recovery was already complete: the Dow Jones Industrial
Average closed 1989 at a record high, just over two years after Black
Monday’s 22.6% single-day crash, capping the bull market that had begun at
the Dow’s 776 low in August 1982. Between the S&L bailout, a wage floor
eroded by years without a raise, and a stock market at new highs, 1989
captured how unevenly the decade’s disinflation had been felt.
MLA: “Inflation from 1915 to 1989: $100 is worth $1,228 today.” InflationCalculator.com, U.S. Bureau of Labor Statistics CPI-U data, https://inflationcalculator.com/inflation/1915-to-1989/
APA: InflationCalculator.com. Inflation from 1915 to 1989. Based on U.S. Bureau of Labor Statistics CPI-U data. Retrieved from https://inflationcalculator.com/inflation/1915-to-1989/