$100 in 1916 is worth $246 in 1955,
because prices increased 145.9% over that period, an average of
2.33% a year.
$100 in 1916 has
the same buying power as
$246
in 1955
Detailed inflation statistics
Cumulative price change
145.9%
Average inflation rate
2.33% per year
Converted amount ($100 base)
$246
Price difference ($100 base)
$146
CPI in 1916
10.9
CPI in 1955
26.8
Inflation in 1916
7.92%
Inflation in 1955
-0.37%
$100 in 1916 → 1955
$246
$100 in 1955 → 1916
$40.67
What happened to prices between 1916 and 1955
Between 1916 and 1955, the Consumer Price Index went from 10.9 to 26.8.
Cumulatively, prices increased 145.9%, which works out to an average of
2.33% per year. Put differently, a dollar in 1916 bought what
$0.41 buys in 1955: the 1916 dollar
lost 59.3% of its purchasing power over
these 39 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 1955 at the same ratio, 2.46: $1,000 becomes
$2,459, and $10,000 becomes $24,587.
Amount in 1916
Value in 1955
$1.00
$2.46
$5.00
$12.29
$10.00
$24.59
$20.00
$49.17
$50.00
$123
$100
$246
$500
$1,229
$1,000
$2,459
$5,000
$12,294
$10,000
$24,587
$100,000
$245,872
$1,000,000
$2,458,716
Inflation by spending category, 1916–1955
Between 1916 and 1955, apparel rose the most, up 155.4%, while food rose the least, up 146.0%, against 145.9% for all items. The headline number is an average; here is what $100 of 1916
spending costs in 1955, by category:
Category
Avg. yearly inflation
$100 in 1916 →
All items (CPI-U)
2.33%
$246
Apparel
2.43%
$255
Food
2.34%
$246
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 1955
Prices climbed fastest in the 1910s, averaging 16.39% a year, and fell in the 1920s (1.8% a year). Each step below chains into the full 1916–1955 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
1930–1940
-1.75%
-16.2%
$128
1940–1950
5.58%
72.1%
$221
1950–1955
2.15%
11.2%
$246
Year by year: CPI and the value of $100 from 1916
$100 from 1916 had already become $128 by
1936, on its way to $246 in 1955; 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 2 years; the calculator above covers any pair of years.
The destination year: 1955
In 1955, prices fell 0.4% and $100 from 1916 had the buying
power of $246; the year's average CPI of 26.8 is the level
behind every 1955 figure on this page.
Consumer prices fell 0.4% in 1955, the first annual decline since 1949,
as a strong rebound from the 1953-54 recession delivered growth without
much price pressure; automakers and appliance makers competed hard on
price for a booming consumer market. Organized labor consolidated that
December, when the American Federation of Labor and the Congress of
Industrial Organizations merged on the 5th under President George Meany,
uniting roughly 15 million workers in the AFL-CIO after two decades as
rival federations. That same day, a different kind of organizing began in
Montgomery, Alabama: four days after Rosa Parks was arrested for refusing
to give up her bus seat to a white passenger, the city’s Black community
began a boycott of its buses that would last more than a year and help
launch the civil rights movement’s mass phase. Markets got a scare that
September: news of Eisenhower’s heart attack on the 24th sent the Dow
Jones Industrial Average to its steepest one-day drop since the 1929
crash when trading resumed that Monday, before stocks recovered as the
president’s health improved. Consumer prices finished 1955 170.7% above
their 1913 level, essentially unchanged from where they
stood a year earlier. First-class postage held at 3 cents, and the
minimum wage stayed at 75 cents an hour.
MLA: “Inflation from 1916 to 1955: $100 is worth $246 today.” InflationCalculator.com, U.S. Bureau of Labor Statistics CPI-U data, https://inflationcalculator.com/inflation/1916-to-1955/
APA: InflationCalculator.com. Inflation from 1916 to 1955. Based on U.S. Bureau of Labor Statistics CPI-U data. Retrieved from https://inflationcalculator.com/inflation/1916-to-1955/