$100 in 1916 is worth $128 in 1936,
because prices increased 27.5% over that period, an average of
1.22% a year.
$100 in 1916 has
the same buying power as
$128
in 1936
Detailed inflation statistics
Cumulative price change
27.5%
Average inflation rate
1.22% per year
Converted amount ($100 base)
$128
Price difference ($100 base)
$27.52
CPI in 1916
10.9
CPI in 1936
13.9
Inflation in 1916
7.92%
Inflation in 1936
1.46%
$100 in 1916 → 1936
$128
$100 in 1936 → 1916
$78.42
What happened to prices between 1916 and 1936
Between 1916 and 1936, the Consumer Price Index went from 10.9 to 13.9.
Cumulatively, prices increased 27.5%, which works out to an average of
1.22% per year. Put differently, a dollar in 1916 bought what
$0.78 buys in 1936: the 1916 dollar
lost 21.6% of its purchasing power over
these 20 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 1936 at the same ratio, 1.28: $1,000 becomes
$1,275, and $10,000 becomes $12,752.
Amount in 1916
Value in 1936
$1.00
$1.28
$5.00
$6.38
$10.00
$12.75
$20.00
$25.50
$50.00
$63.76
$100
$128
$500
$638
$1,000
$1,275
$5,000
$6,376
$10,000
$12,752
$100,000
$127,523
$1,000,000
$1,275,229
Inflation by spending category, 1916–1936
Between 1916 and 1936, apparel rose the most, up 25.0%, while food rose the least, up 11.5%, against 27.5% for all items. The headline number is an average; here is what $100 of 1916
spending costs in 1936, by category:
Category
Avg. yearly inflation
$100 in 1916 →
All items (CPI-U)
1.22%
$128
Apparel
1.12%
$125
Food
0.55%
$112
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–).
Decade by decade: 1916 to 1936
Prices climbed fastest in the 1910s, averaging 16.39% a year, and fell in the 1930s (3.0% a year). Each step below chains into the full 1916–1936 change:
Years
Avg. yearly inflation
Price change
$100 from 1916, at end
1916–1920
16.39%
83.5%
$183
1920–1930
-1.79%
-16.5%
$153
1930–1936
-3.01%
-16.8%
$128
Year by year: CPI and the value of $100 from 1916
$100 from 1916 had already become $162 by
1926, on its way to $128 in 1936; 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.
In 1936, prices rose 1.5% and $100 from 1916 had the buying
power of $128; the year's average CPI of 13.9 is the level
behind every 1936 figure on this page.
Consumer prices rose 1.5% in 1936, a third straight annual increase and part
of a slow, steady climb back from the 1933 trough, though
prices and the broader economy still had not fully recovered to their
pre-Depression levels. Voters delivered their verdict on that recovery in
November, reelecting Franklin D. Roosevelt over Republican Alf Landon in one
of the most lopsided elections in U.S. history: Roosevelt carried 46 of 48
states and won the Electoral College 523 to 8, a broad public endorsement of
the New Deal. Public works kept advancing that year, too. Hoover Dam, one of
the era’s signature projects, had been dedicated in September 1935, but its
first generators did not begin sending electricity over transmission lines
to Los Angeles until October 1936, a milestone that showed how long even a
celebrated project took to reach full operation. Consumer prices ended the
year 40.4% above their 1913 level, still 18.7% below the
1929 peak, a gap that would keep narrowing until a sharp new recession
interrupted the recovery the following year. First-class postage held at 3
cents.
MLA: “Inflation from 1916 to 1936: $100 is worth $128 today.” InflationCalculator.com, U.S. Bureau of Labor Statistics CPI-U data, https://inflationcalculator.com/inflation/1916-to-1936/
APA: InflationCalculator.com. Inflation from 1916 to 1936. Based on U.S. Bureau of Labor Statistics CPI-U data. Retrieved from https://inflationcalculator.com/inflation/1916-to-1936/