$100 in 1916 is worth $139 in 1918,
because prices increased 38.5% over that period, an average of
17.70% a year.
$100 in 1916 has
the same buying power as
$139
in 1918
Detailed inflation statistics
Cumulative price change
38.5%
Average inflation rate
17.70% per year
Converted amount ($100 base)
$139
Price difference ($100 base)
$38.53
CPI in 1916
10.9
CPI in 1918
15.1
Inflation in 1916
7.92%
Inflation in 1918
17.97%
$100 in 1916 → 1918
$139
$100 in 1918 → 1916
$72.19
What happened to prices between 1916 and 1918
Between 1916 and 1918, the Consumer Price Index went from 10.9 to 15.1.
Cumulatively, prices increased 38.5%, which works out to an average of
17.70% per year. Put differently, a dollar in 1916 bought what
$0.72 buys in 1918: the 1916 dollar
lost 27.8% of its purchasing power over
these 2 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 1918 at the same ratio, 1.39: $1,000 becomes
$1,385, and $10,000 becomes $13,853.
Amount in 1916
Value in 1918
$1.00
$1.39
$5.00
$6.93
$10.00
$13.85
$20.00
$27.71
$50.00
$69.27
$100
$139
$500
$693
$1,000
$1,385
$5,000
$6,927
$10,000
$13,853
$100,000
$138,532
$1,000,000
$1,385,321
Inflation by spending category, 1916–1918
Between 1916 and 1918, apparel rose the most, up 62.5%, while food rose the least, up 47.8%, against 38.5% for all items. The headline number is an average; here is what $100 of 1916
spending costs in 1918, by category:
Category
Avg. yearly inflation
$100 in 1916 →
All items (CPI-U)
17.70%
$139
Apparel
27.48%
$163
Food
21.57%
$148
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 1916 had already become $117 by
1917, on its way to $139 in 1918; 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 the smallest rise was 17.4% in 1917.
In 1918, prices rose 18.0% and $100 from 1916 had the buying
power of $139; the year's average CPI of 15.1 is the level
behind every 1918 figure on this page.
1918 brought the steepest annual price increase the CPI had recorded:
consumer prices rose 18.0% for the year, edging out 1917’s already sharp
17.4% as the economy stayed at full wartime mobilization for most of the
year. A first-class stamp cost 3 cents, up from 2 cents the previous
November under the War Revenue Act’s wartime tax increases. The war itself
ended on November 11, when Germany signed an armistice with the Allied
powers after more than four years of fighting in Europe, but the inflation
built up over a year and a half of mobilization did not disappear along with
the fighting. The bigger public health story that year was the influenza
pandemic that reached the U.S. in a mild spring wave and then returned that
fall in a far deadlier form, eventually killing roughly 675,000 Americans,
more than the country’s combat losses in the war. It hit factories, docks,
and shops alongside households, adding disruption to an economy already
strained by wartime demand. Prices would keep climbing even after the
armistice, into the postwar surge of 1919.
MLA: “Inflation from 1916 to 1918: $100 is worth $139 today.” InflationCalculator.com, U.S. Bureau of Labor Statistics CPI-U data, https://inflationcalculator.com/inflation/1916-to-1918/
APA: InflationCalculator.com. Inflation from 1916 to 1918. Based on U.S. Bureau of Labor Statistics CPI-U data. Retrieved from https://inflationcalculator.com/inflation/1916-to-1918/