$100 in 1920 is worth $620 in 1989,
because prices increased 520.0% over that period, an average of
2.68% a year.
$100 in 1920 has
the same buying power as
$620
in 1989
Detailed inflation statistics
Cumulative price change
520.0%
Average inflation rate
2.68% per year
Converted amount ($100 base)
$620
Price difference ($100 base)
$520
CPI in 1920
20
CPI in 1989
124
Inflation in 1920
15.61%
Inflation in 1989
4.82%
$100 in 1920 → 1989
$620
$100 in 1989 → 1920
$16.13
What happened to prices between 1920 and 1989
Between 1920 and 1989, the Consumer Price Index went from 20 to 124.
Cumulatively, prices increased 520.0%, which works out to an average of
2.68% per year. Put differently, a dollar in 1920 bought what
$0.16 buys in 1989: the 1920 dollar
lost 83.9% of its purchasing power over
these 69 years.
1920 was the last year of the inflation that had built since the war began:
consumer prices rose 15.6% for the year, leaving the CPI more than double its
1913 starting level after seven straight years of increases.
The boom behind those increases turned to bust before the year was over. The
Federal Reserve, worried about speculation, pushed its discount rate to a
record 7% that spring, and wholesale prices, which had led the wartime
runup, began collapsing within months. The National Bureau of Economic
Research dates the resulting downturn from January 1920 to July 1921, one of
the shortest but steepest contractions in U.S. history, and consumer prices
followed into outright decline, falling 10.5% in 1921. Two constitutional
changes reshaped the country that year, too. The 18th Amendment’s ban on
alcohol took legal effect January 17, enforced under the Volstead Act
Congress had passed the previous October. Then, on August 18, Tennessee’s
ratification of the 19th Amendment secured women’s right to vote nationwide,
and women cast ballots in a presidential election for the first time that
November, when Warren Harding won on a promise to return the country to
“normalcy” after a decade of war, pandemic, and rising prices. First-class
postage held at 2 cents, unchanged since mid-1919.
Every 1920 amount converts to 1989 at the same ratio, 6.20: $1,000 becomes
$6,200, and $10,000 becomes $62,000.
Amount in 1920
Value in 1989
$1.00
$6.20
$5.00
$31.00
$10.00
$62.00
$20.00
$124
$50.00
$310
$100
$620
$500
$3,100
$1,000
$6,200
$5,000
$31,000
$10,000
$62,000
$100,000
$620,000
$1,000,000
$6,200,000
Inflation by spending category, 1920–1989
Between 1920 and 1989, food rose the most, up 495.7%, while apparel rose the least, up 175.2%, against 520.0% for all items. The headline number is an average; here is what $100 of 1920
spending costs in 1989, by category:
Category
Avg. yearly inflation
$100 in 1920 →
All items (CPI-U)
2.68%
$620
Food
2.62%
$596
Apparel
1.48%
$275
Not shown because the BLS began these indexes after 1920: core (all items less food & energy) (1957–), energy (1957–), housing (1967–), medical care (1935–), transportation (1935–), recreation (1993–), education & communication (1993–).
Decade by decade: 1920 to 1989
Prices climbed fastest in the 1970s, averaging 7.82% a year, and fell in the 1920s (1.8% a year). Each step below chains into the full 1920–1989 change:
Years
Avg. yearly inflation
Price change
$100 from 1920, at end
1920–1930
-1.79%
-16.5%
$83.50
1930–1940
-1.75%
-16.2%
$70.00
1940–1950
5.58%
72.1%
$121
1950–1960
2.08%
22.8%
$148
1960–1970
2.74%
31.1%
$194
1970–1980
7.82%
112.4%
$412
1980–1989
4.65%
50.5%
$620
Year by year: CPI and the value of $100 from 1920
$100 from 1920 had already become $134 by
1955, on its way to $620 in 1989; each row shows the CPI, that
year's inflation rate, and the running value.
Within the span, inflation peaked at 14.4% in 1947, 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: 1989
In 1989, prices rose 4.8% and $100 from 1920 had the buying
power of $620; the year's average CPI of 124 is the level
behind every 1989 figure on this page.
1989 closed out a decade that began in economic crisis and ended in a long,
calmer expansion. Inflation for the year came in at 4.8%, higher than the
mid-decade lull but still roughly a third of the 13.5% peak that had opened
the decade in 1980. The federal minimum wage, unchanged at $3.35 an hour
since January 1981, had gone longer without an increase than at any point
since Congress created it, and had lost close to a third of its purchasing
power to inflation in the meantime; lawmakers would finally raise it to
$3.80 the following April. The decade’s other unfinished business came due
in August, when Congress passed FIRREA, the law that created the Resolution
Trust Corporation to seize and sell off the hundreds of savings and loan
institutions that a decade of deregulation and risky lending had left
insolvent, a bailout that eventually cost taxpayers over $100 billion. On
Wall Street, the recovery was already complete: the Dow Jones Industrial
Average closed 1989 at a record high, just over two years after Black
Monday’s 22.6% single-day crash, capping the bull market that had begun at
the Dow’s 776 low in August 1982. Between the S&L bailout, a wage floor
eroded by years without a raise, and a stock market at new highs, 1989
captured how unevenly the decade’s disinflation had been felt.
MLA: “Inflation from 1920 to 1989: $100 is worth $620 today.” InflationCalculator.com, U.S. Bureau of Labor Statistics CPI-U data, https://inflationcalculator.com/inflation/1920-to-1989/
APA: InflationCalculator.com. Inflation from 1920 to 1989. Based on U.S. Bureau of Labor Statistics CPI-U data. Retrieved from https://inflationcalculator.com/inflation/1920-to-1989/