$100 in 1916 is worth $117 in 1917,
because prices increased 17.4% over that period, an average of
17.43% a year.
$100 in 1916 has
the same buying power as
$117
in 1917
Detailed inflation statistics
Cumulative price change
17.4%
Average inflation rate
17.43% per year
Converted amount ($100 base)
$117
Price difference ($100 base)
$17.43
CPI in 1916
10.9
CPI in 1917
12.8
Inflation in 1916
7.92%
Inflation in 1917
17.43%
$100 in 1916 → 1917
$117
$100 in 1917 → 1916
$85.16
What happened to prices between 1916 and 1917
Between 1916 and 1917, the Consumer Price Index went from 10.9 to 12.8.
Cumulatively, prices increased 17.4%, which works out to an average of
17.43% per year. Put differently, a dollar in 1916 bought what
$0.85 buys in 1917: the 1916 dollar
lost 14.8% of its purchasing power over
these 1 years.
1916 was when World War I first showed up clearly in American price tags.
Consumer prices rose 7.9% for the year, easily the sharpest increase since
the Bureau of Labor Statistics’ CPI history begins in 1913, as factories ran
flat out to fill steel, munitions, and food orders from Britain and France.
Railroad workers felt the squeeze from rising living costs enough to threaten
a nationwide strike; Congress headed it off in September with the Adamson
Act, which set an eight-hour standard workday for interstate rail employees,
the first federal law of its kind covering private-sector hours. Washington
was also preparing more directly for war: the National Defense Act, signed
in June, expanded the Army and National Guard and funded new
government-owned munitions plants, adding another source of demand to an
economy already running hot. Woodrow Wilson won re-election in November
largely on having kept the country out of the fighting so far, a promise
that would not survive the following spring. A first-class stamp still cost
2 cents, one of the few prices that had not yet moved.
Every 1916 amount converts to 1917 at the same ratio, 1.17: $1,000 becomes
$1,174, and $10,000 becomes $11,743.
Amount in 1916
Value in 1917
$1.00
$1.17
$5.00
$5.87
$10.00
$11.74
$20.00
$23.49
$50.00
$58.72
$100
$117
$500
$587
$1,000
$1,174
$5,000
$5,872
$10,000
$11,743
$100,000
$117,431
$1,000,000
$1,174,312
Inflation by spending category, 1916–1917
Between 1916 and 1917, food rose the most, up 28.3%, while apparel rose the least, up 20.2%, against 17.4% for all items. The headline number is an average; here is what $100 of 1916
spending costs in 1917, by category:
Category
Avg. yearly inflation
$100 in 1916 →
All items (CPI-U)
17.43%
$117
Food
28.32%
$128
Apparel
20.24%
$120
Not shown because the BLS began these indexes after 1916: 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 1916
$100 from 1916grew to $117 by 1917; each row
shows the CPI, that year's inflation rate, and the running value.
In 1917, prices rose 17.4% and $100 from 1916 had the buying
power of $117; 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 1916 to 1917: $100 is worth $117 today.” InflationCalculator.com, U.S. Bureau of Labor Statistics CPI-U data, https://inflationcalculator.com/inflation/1916-to-1917/
APA: InflationCalculator.com. Inflation from 1916 to 1917. Based on U.S. Bureau of Labor Statistics CPI-U data. Retrieved from https://inflationcalculator.com/inflation/1916-to-1917/