$100 in 1918 is worth $1,079 in 1998,
because prices increased 979.5% over that period, an average of
3.02% a year.
$100 in 1918 has
the same buying power as
$1,079
in 1998
Detailed inflation statistics
Cumulative price change
979.5%
Average inflation rate
3.02% per year
Converted amount ($100 base)
$1,079
Price difference ($100 base)
$979
CPI in 1918
15.1
CPI in 1998
163
Inflation in 1918
17.97%
Inflation in 1998
1.56%
$100 in 1918 → 1998
$1,079
$100 in 1998 → 1918
$9.26
What happened to prices between 1918 and 1998
Between 1918 and 1998, the Consumer Price Index went from 15.1 to 163.
Cumulatively, prices increased 979.5%, which works out to an average of
3.02% per year. Put differently, a dollar in 1918 bought what
$0.09 buys in 1998: the 1918 dollar
lost 90.7% of its purchasing power over
these 80 years.
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.
Every 1918 amount converts to 1998 at the same ratio, 10.79: $1,000 becomes
$10,795, and $10,000 becomes $107,947.
Amount in 1918
Value in 1998
$1.00
$10.79
$5.00
$53.97
$10.00
$108
$20.00
$216
$50.00
$540
$100
$1,079
$500
$5,397
$1,000
$10,795
$5,000
$53,974
$10,000
$107,947
$100,000
$1,079,470
$1,000,000
$10,794,702
Inflation by spending category, 1918–1998
Between 1918 and 1998, food rose the most, up 862.3%, while apparel rose the least, up 387.2%, against 979.5% for all items. The headline number is an average; here is what $100 of 1918
spending costs in 1998, by category:
Category
Avg. yearly inflation
$100 in 1918 →
All items (CPI-U)
3.02%
$1,079
Food
2.87%
$962
Apparel
2.00%
$487
Not shown because the BLS began these indexes after 1918: core (all items less food & energy) (1957–), energy (1957–), housing (1967–), medical care (1935–), transportation (1935–), recreation (1993–), education & communication (1993–).
Decade by decade: 1918 to 1998
Prices climbed fastest in the 1910s, averaging 15.09% a year, and fell in the 1920s (1.8% a year). Each step below chains into the full 1918–1998 change:
Years
Avg. yearly inflation
Price change
$100 from 1918, at end
1918–1920
15.09%
32.5%
$132
1920–1930
-1.79%
-16.5%
$111
1930–1940
-1.75%
-16.2%
$92.72
1940–1950
5.58%
72.1%
$160
1950–1960
2.08%
22.8%
$196
1960–1970
2.74%
31.1%
$257
1970–1980
7.82%
112.4%
$546
1980–1990
4.72%
58.6%
$866
1990–1998
2.80%
24.7%
$1,079
Year by year: CPI and the value of $100 from 1918
$100 from 1918 had already become $191 by
1958, on its way to $1,079 in 1998; each row shows the CPI, that
year's inflation rate, and the running value.
Within the span, inflation peaked at 15.6% in 1920, 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: 1998
In 1998, prices rose 1.6% and $100 from 1918 had the buying
power of $1,079; the year's average CPI of 163 is the level
behind every 1998 figure on this page.
The median household earned about $38,900 in 1998, gas averaged just $1.06 a gallon, its
cheapest of the decade, and a new home cost roughly $152,500. Inflation ran at 1.6% for the
year, the lowest of the 1990s, as a glut of crude oil, worsened by weak demand from Asia’s
slowdown, pushed prices below $11 a barrel by December and pulled pump prices down with them.
The calm at home came alongside real turmoil abroad: in August, Russia devalued the ruble and
defaulted on its domestic debt, rattling markets already unsettled by the Asian financial
crisis, and in September the hedge fund Long-Term Capital Management collapsed after its highly
leveraged bets went bad, prompting the Federal Reserve to organize a private-sector bailout by
more than a dozen banks to prevent a disorderly unwinding of its roughly $100 billion in
positions. The Fed also cut interest rates three times that fall, in September, October, and
November, an insurance policy against the global financial turmoil spreading to the U.S.
economy. Cheap oil and a well-timed set of rate cuts left 1998 as a year the U.S. economy
absorbed two foreign financial crises without much of a dent at home.
MLA: “Inflation from 1918 to 1998: $100 is worth $1,079 today.” InflationCalculator.com, U.S. Bureau of Labor Statistics CPI-U data, https://inflationcalculator.com/inflation/1918-to-1998/
APA: InflationCalculator.com. Inflation from 1918 to 1998. Based on U.S. Bureau of Labor Statistics CPI-U data. Retrieved from https://inflationcalculator.com/inflation/1918-to-1998/