$100 in 1917 is worth $754 in 1982,
because prices increased 653.9% over that period, an average of
3.16% a year.
$100 in 1917 has
the same buying power as
$754
in 1982
Detailed inflation statistics
Cumulative price change
653.9%
Average inflation rate
3.16% per year
Converted amount ($100 base)
$754
Price difference ($100 base)
$654
CPI in 1917
12.8
CPI in 1982
96.5
Inflation in 1917
17.43%
Inflation in 1982
6.16%
$100 in 1917 → 1982
$754
$100 in 1982 → 1917
$13.26
What happened to prices between 1917 and 1982
Between 1917 and 1982, the Consumer Price Index went from 12.8 to 96.5.
Cumulatively, prices increased 653.9%, which works out to an average of
3.16% per year. Put differently, a dollar in 1917 bought what
$0.13 buys in 1982: the 1917 dollar
lost 86.7% of its purchasing power over
these 65 years.
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.
Every 1917 amount converts to 1982 at the same ratio, 7.54: $1,000 becomes
$7,539, and $10,000 becomes $75,391.
Amount in 1917
Value in 1982
$1.00
$7.54
$5.00
$37.70
$10.00
$75.39
$20.00
$151
$50.00
$377
$100
$754
$500
$3,770
$1,000
$7,539
$5,000
$37,695
$10,000
$75,391
$100,000
$753,906
$1,000,000
$7,539,063
Inflation by spending category, 1917–1982
Between 1917 and 1982, food rose the most, up 571.7%, while apparel rose the least, up 384.2%, against 653.9% for all items. The headline number is an average; here is what $100 of 1917
spending costs in 1982, by category:
Category
Avg. yearly inflation
$100 in 1917 →
All items (CPI-U)
3.16%
$754
Food
2.97%
$672
Apparel
2.46%
$484
Not shown because the BLS began these indexes after 1917: core (all items less food & energy) (1957–), energy (1957–), housing (1967–), medical care (1935–), transportation (1935–), recreation (1993–), education & communication (1993–).
Decade by decade: 1917 to 1982
Prices climbed fastest in the 1910s, averaging 16.04% a year, and fell in the 1920s (1.8% a year). Each step below chains into the full 1917–1982 change:
Years
Avg. yearly inflation
Price change
$100 from 1917, at end
1917–1920
16.04%
56.3%
$156
1920–1930
-1.79%
-16.5%
$130
1930–1940
-1.75%
-16.2%
$109
1940–1950
5.58%
72.1%
$188
1950–1960
2.08%
22.8%
$231
1960–1970
2.74%
31.1%
$303
1970–1980
7.82%
112.4%
$644
1980–1982
8.22%
17.1%
$754
Year by year: CPI and the value of $100 from 1917
$100 from 1917 had already become $174 by
1947, on its way to $754 in 1982; 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: 1982
In 1982, prices rose 6.2% and $100 from 1917 had the buying
power of $754; the year's average CPI of 96.5 is the level
behind every 1982 figure on this page.
1982 was the hard bottom of the disinflation Paul Volcker had set in motion.
Consumer prices rose just 6.2% for the year, roughly half of 1981’s rate and a
fraction of the 13.5% peak from two years earlier. The price fell because
demand had been crushed: the recession that began in July 1981 did not
officially end until November 1982, and unemployment kept climbing even as
the economy technically began to recover, reaching 10.8% in November and
December, the highest rate since the Great Depression. Manufacturing and
construction, especially the auto and housing industries starved of credit by
double-digit interest rates, bore the worst of it. Abroad, Mexico’s August
announcement that it could not service its foreign debt opened a Latin
American debt crisis that spread across the region and forced the Federal
Reserve and IMF into emergency lending. The stress on the financial system
pushed Volcker to start easing interest rates that October, stepping back
from the strict money-supply targets he had followed since 1979. Markets read
the shift correctly: the Dow Jones Industrial Average bottomed at 776.92 in
mid-August, and the rally that followed became the opening leg of the 1980s
bull market. By year’s end, the trade-off Volcker had bet on was becoming
visible: much lower inflation, at the cost of the worst unemployment in 40
years.
MLA: “Inflation from 1917 to 1982: $100 is worth $754 today.” InflationCalculator.com, U.S. Bureau of Labor Statistics CPI-U data, https://inflationcalculator.com/inflation/1917-to-1982/
APA: InflationCalculator.com. Inflation from 1917 to 1982. Based on U.S. Bureau of Labor Statistics CPI-U data. Retrieved from https://inflationcalculator.com/inflation/1917-to-1982/