$100 in 1915 is worth $2,683 in 2021,
because prices increased 2582.9% over that period, an average of
3.15% a year.
$100 in 1915 has
the same buying power as
$2,683
in 2021
Detailed inflation statistics
Cumulative price change
2582.9%
Average inflation rate
3.15% per year
Converted amount ($100 base)
$2,683
Price difference ($100 base)
$2,583
CPI in 1915
10.1
CPI in 2021
270.97
Inflation in 1915
1.00%
Inflation in 2021
4.70%
$100 in 1915 → 2021
$2,683
$100 in 2021 → 1915
$3.73
What happened to prices between 1915 and 2021
Between 1915 and 2021, the Consumer Price Index went from 10.1 to 270.97.
Cumulatively, prices increased 2582.9%, which works out to an average of
3.15% per year. Put differently, a dollar in 1915 bought what
$0.04 buys in 2021: the 1915 dollar
lost 96.3% of its purchasing power over
these 106 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 2021 at the same ratio, 26.83: $1,000 becomes
$26,829, and $10,000 becomes $268,287.
Amount in 1915
Value in 2021
$1.00
$26.83
$5.00
$134
$10.00
$268
$20.00
$537
$50.00
$1,341
$100
$2,683
$500
$13,414
$1,000
$26,829
$5,000
$134,144
$10,000
$268,287
$100,000
$2,682,871
$1,000,000
$26,828,713
Inflation by spending category, 1915–2021
Between 1915 and 2021, food rose the most, up 2677.6%, while apparel rose the least, up 690.8%, against 2582.9% for all items. The headline number is an average; here is what $100 of 1915
spending costs in 2021, by category:
Category
Avg. yearly inflation
$100 in 1915 →
All items (CPI-U)
3.15%
$2,683
Food
3.19%
$2,778
Apparel
1.97%
$791
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 2021
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 1915–2021 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
1980–1990
4.72%
58.6%
$1,294
1990–2000
2.80%
31.8%
$1,705
2000–2010
2.39%
26.6%
$2,159
2010–2020
1.73%
18.7%
$2,562
2020–2021
4.70%
4.7%
$2,683
Year by year: CPI and the value of $100 from 1915
$100 from 1915 had already become $384 by
1970, on its way to $2,683 in 2021; 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: 2021
In 2021, prices rose 4.7% and $100 from 1915 had the buying
power of $2,683; the year's average CPI of 270.97 is the level
behind every 2021 figure on this page.
2021 was the year inflation stopped being background noise. Consumer prices
rose 4.7% on average for the year, and the pace kept building as the months
went on: by December, the 12-month rate had reached 7.0%, the highest since
1982. The proximate cause was a supply chain that could not keep up with a
fast-reopening economy. A global semiconductor shortage choked new car
production and pushed used vehicle prices up by more than a third, the
single largest line item in the year’s inflation math. Lumber, appliances,
and shipping capacity told versions of the same story: demand snapped back
faster than factories, ports, and truckers could handle it. Washington added
fuel in March with the $1.9 trillion American Rescue Plan, on top of the
relief already in the pipeline since 2020. For most of the year, the Federal
Reserve called the price surge “transitory,” a temporary reopening effect
expected to fade on its own, and held its policy rate near zero. By
November, with inflation still climbing, the Fed reversed course and began
winding down its bond purchases, the first step toward the rate hikes that
would follow in 2022. Gas averaged $3.01 a gallon for the year, up from
about $2.17 in 2020, while the federal minimum wage held at $7.25,
unchanged since 2009. In hindsight, 2021 reads as the hinge year: the point
where “transitory” inflation became the multi-year fight the Fed spent the
next two years trying to win.
MLA: “Inflation from 1915 to 2021: $100 is worth $2,683 today.” InflationCalculator.com, U.S. Bureau of Labor Statistics CPI-U data, https://inflationcalculator.com/inflation/1915-to-2021/
APA: InflationCalculator.com. Inflation from 1915 to 2021. Based on U.S. Bureau of Labor Statistics CPI-U data. Retrieved from https://inflationcalculator.com/inflation/1915-to-2021/