$100 in 1919 is worth $1,300 in 2011,
because prices increased 1200.2% over that period, an average of
2.83% a year.
$100 in 1919 has
the same buying power as
$1,300
in 2011
Detailed inflation statistics
Cumulative price change
1200.2%
Average inflation rate
2.83% per year
Converted amount ($100 base)
$1,300
Price difference ($100 base)
$1,200
CPI in 1919
17.3
CPI in 2011
224.939
Inflation in 1919
14.57%
Inflation in 2011
3.16%
$100 in 1919 → 2011
$1,300
$100 in 2011 → 1919
$7.69
What happened to prices between 1919 and 2011
Between 1919 and 2011, the Consumer Price Index went from 17.3 to 224.939.
Cumulatively, prices increased 1200.2%, which works out to an average of
2.83% per year. Put differently, a dollar in 1919 bought what
$0.08 buys in 2011: the 1919 dollar
lost 92.3% of its purchasing power over
these 92 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 2011 at the same ratio, 13.00: $1,000 becomes
$13,002, and $10,000 becomes $130,023.
Amount in 1919
Value in 2011
$1.00
$13.00
$5.00
$65.01
$10.00
$130
$20.00
$260
$50.00
$650
$100
$1,300
$500
$6,501
$1,000
$13,002
$5,000
$65,011
$10,000
$130,023
$100,000
$1,300,225
$1,000,000
$13,002,254
Inflation by spending category, 1919–2011
Between 1919 and 2011, food rose the most, up 1125.0%, while apparel rose the least, up 237.3%, against 1200.2% for all items. The headline number is an average; here is what $100 of 1919
spending costs in 2011, by category:
Category
Avg. yearly inflation
$100 in 1919 →
All items (CPI-U)
2.83%
$1,300
Food
2.76%
$1,225
Apparel
1.33%
$337
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 2011
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 1919–2011 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
2000–2010
2.39%
26.6%
$1,260
2010–2011
3.16%
3.2%
$1,300
Year by year: CPI and the value of $100 from 1919
$100 from 1919 had already become $179 by
1964, on its way to $1,300 in 2011; 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: 2011
In 2011, prices rose 3.2% and $100 from 1919 had the buying
power of $1,300; the year's average CPI of 224.939 is the level
behind every 2011 figure on this page.
2011 brought the fastest inflation of the post-recession recovery. Consumer
prices rose 3.2%, roughly double the 2010 pace, and the cause was mostly at the
pump and the grocery store. Unrest across the Middle East and North Africa,
including the war in Libya, pushed gasoline to an annual average of $3.52 a
gallon, the highest yearly figure recorded to that point. Food prices also
rose faster than the overall index.
Household budgets did not keep up. The median household income was $50,054,
barely above the year before, and the median new home sold for about $227,200.
The federal minimum wage stayed at $7.25 and a first-class stamp at 44 cents.
Policy stayed loose. The Federal Reserve kept its policy rate near zero and
launched Operation Twist in September to lower long-term rates. Washington
spent the summer in a debt-ceiling fight that ended in S&P’s August downgrade
of the U.S. credit rating. The inflation spike proved temporary: the
2011 rate was the high point of the early 2010s, and prices grew more slowly
in every year that followed until 2017.
MLA: “Inflation from 1919 to 2011: $100 is worth $1,300 today.” InflationCalculator.com, U.S. Bureau of Labor Statistics CPI-U data, https://inflationcalculator.com/inflation/1919-to-2011/
APA: InflationCalculator.com. Inflation from 1919 to 2011. Based on U.S. Bureau of Labor Statistics CPI-U data. Retrieved from https://inflationcalculator.com/inflation/1919-to-2011/