$100 in 1919 is worth $1,240 in 2009,
because prices increased 1140.1% over that period, an average of
2.84% a year.
$100 in 1919 has
the same buying power as
$1,240
in 2009
Detailed inflation statistics
Cumulative price change
1140.1%
Average inflation rate
2.84% per year
Converted amount ($100 base)
$1,240
Price difference ($100 base)
$1,140
CPI in 1919
17.3
CPI in 2009
214.537
Inflation in 1919
14.57%
Inflation in 2009
-0.36%
$100 in 1919 → 2009
$1,240
$100 in 2009 → 1919
$8.06
What happened to prices between 1919 and 2009
Between 1919 and 2009, the Consumer Price Index went from 17.3 to 214.537.
Cumulatively, prices increased 1140.1%, which works out to an average of
2.84% per year. Put differently, a dollar in 1919 bought what
$0.08 buys in 2009: the 1919 dollar
lost 91.9% of its purchasing power over
these 90 years.
The fighting in Europe ended in November 1918, but American prices kept
climbing through 1919 almost as fast as they had during the war itself,
rising 14.6% for the year. Wartime price and production controls were being
dismantled, millions of soldiers were returning to the civilian labor
market, and demand that had been held back for years ran into supply that
had not caught up, a combination that kept the cost of living rising even
with the guns silent. Workers, whose pay had fallen behind three straight
years of double-digit inflation, pushed back: a general strike shut down
Seattle in February, Boston’s police force walked out in September, and a
nationwide steel strike that same month drew in roughly 350,000 workers and
ran into the following January. One price did fall that year: first-class
postage reverted to 2 cents on July 1, ending the wartime 3-cent rate that
had funded part of the war effort since late 1917. By year’s end, prices had
risen close to 75% since the CPI’s 1913 starting point,
compressing more than a decade of typical peacetime inflation into six years
of war and its aftermath.
Every 1919 amount converts to 2009 at the same ratio, 12.40: $1,000 becomes
$12,401, and $10,000 becomes $124,010.
Amount in 1919
Value in 2009
$1.00
$12.40
$5.00
$62.00
$10.00
$124
$20.00
$248
$50.00
$620
$100
$1,240
$500
$6,200
$1,000
$12,401
$5,000
$62,005
$10,000
$124,010
$100,000
$1,240,098
$1,000,000
$12,400,983
Inflation by spending category, 1919–2009
Between 1919 and 2009, food rose the most, up 1071.8%, while apparel rose the least, up 231.7%, against 1140.1% for all items. The headline number is an average; here is what $100 of 1919
spending costs in 2009, by category:
Category
Avg. yearly inflation
$100 in 1919 →
All items (CPI-U)
2.84%
$1,240
Food
2.77%
$1,172
Apparel
1.34%
$332
Not shown because the BLS began these indexes after 1919: core (all items less food & energy) (1957–), energy (1957–), housing (1967–), medical care (1935–), transportation (1935–), recreation (1993–), education & communication (1993–).
Decade by decade: 1919 to 2009
Prices climbed fastest in the 1910s, averaging 15.61% a year, and fell in the 1920s (1.8% a year). Each step below chains into the full 1919–2009 change:
Years
Avg. yearly inflation
Price change
$100 from 1919, at end
1919–1920
15.61%
15.6%
$116
1920–1930
-1.79%
-16.5%
$96.53
1930–1940
-1.75%
-16.2%
$80.92
1940–1950
5.58%
72.1%
$139
1950–1960
2.08%
22.8%
$171
1960–1970
2.74%
31.1%
$224
1970–1980
7.82%
112.4%
$476
1980–1990
4.72%
58.6%
$755
1990–2000
2.80%
31.8%
$995
2000–2009
2.47%
24.6%
$1,240
Year by year: CPI and the value of $100 from 1919
$100 from 1919 had already become $179 by
1964, on its way to $1,240 in 2009; 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: 2009
In 2009, prices fell 0.4% and $100 from 1919 had the buying
power of $1,240; the year's average CPI of 214.537 is the level
behind every 2009 figure on this page.
2009 is the rarest kind of year in the modern price data: one where the cost
of living went down. The CPI fell 0.4%, the first full-year deflation
since 1955, as the Great Recession hollowed out demand and oil unwound from
its $147 spike the summer before. Gasoline that had cost over $4 a gallon in
July 2008 averaged $2.35 in 2009, and that energy collapse dragged the
12-month inflation rate to −2.1% by July, the deepest reading since 1950.
Policymakers treated falling prices not as relief but as a warning: deflation
raises the real weight of debt precisely when households are drowning in it,
which is why the Federal Reserve pinned interest rates near zero, began buying
bonds by the hundreds of billions, and Washington passed a $787 billion
stimulus. The medicine took: prices stabilized within a year, and 2009 remains
the textbook case of why central banks fear deflation more than moderate
inflation.
MLA: “Inflation from 1919 to 2009: $100 is worth $1,240 today.” InflationCalculator.com, U.S. Bureau of Labor Statistics CPI-U data, https://inflationcalculator.com/inflation/1919-to-2009/
APA: InflationCalculator.com. Inflation from 1919 to 2009. Based on U.S. Bureau of Labor Statistics CPI-U data. Retrieved from https://inflationcalculator.com/inflation/1919-to-2009/