$100 in 1921 is worth $165 in 1960,
because prices increased 65.4% over that period, an average of
1.30% a year.
$100 in 1921 has
the same buying power as
$165
in 1960
Detailed inflation statistics
Cumulative price change
65.4%
Average inflation rate
1.30% per year
Converted amount ($100 base)
$165
Price difference ($100 base)
$65.36
CPI in 1921
17.9
CPI in 1960
29.6
Inflation in 1921
-10.50%
Inflation in 1960
1.72%
$100 in 1921 → 1960
$165
$100 in 1960 → 1921
$60.47
What happened to prices between 1921 and 1960
Between 1921 and 1960, the Consumer Price Index went from 17.9 to 29.6.
Cumulatively, prices increased 65.4%, which works out to an average of
1.30% per year. Put differently, a dollar in 1921 bought what
$0.60 buys in 1960: the 1921 dollar
lost 39.5% of its purchasing power over
these 39 years.
Consumer prices fell 10.5% in 1921, the mirror image of the wartime
inflation that had more than doubled the cost of living between
1913 and 1920. The Depression of 1920-21, one
of the sharpest contractions in U.S. history, bottomed out that July
according to the National Bureau of Economic Research, even though it had
lasted barely eighteen months. Unemployment climbed toward one worker in ten
as businesses cut production and prices to work through wartime inventories,
but the same collapse in prices also meant the recovery, once it started,
had room to run without reigniting inflation. Warren Harding took office
March 4, promising a return to “normalcy” after a decade of war, pandemic,
labor unrest, and rapid price swings; his administration moved quickly to
cut top income tax rates and federal spending. Congress also acted on
immigration that year: the Emergency Quota Act, signed May 19, capped annual
arrivals from each country at 3% of that nationality’s population in the
1910 census, the first time the United States had set a numerical ceiling on
immigration. The law favored northern and western Europe and cut total
immigration by more than half compared with prewar levels; Congress
tightened the formula again in 1924. First-class postage held at 2 cents,
unchanged since mid-1919.
Every 1921 amount converts to 1960 at the same ratio, 1.65: $1,000 becomes
$1,654, and $10,000 becomes $16,536.
Amount in 1921
Value in 1960
$1.00
$1.65
$5.00
$8.27
$10.00
$16.54
$20.00
$33.07
$50.00
$82.68
$100
$165
$500
$827
$1,000
$1,654
$5,000
$8,268
$10,000
$16,536
$100,000
$165,363
$1,000,000
$1,653,631
Inflation by spending category, 1921–1960
Between 1921 and 1960, food rose the most, up 88.7%, while apparel rose the least, up 37.7%, against 65.4% for all items. The headline number is an average; here is what $100 of 1921
spending costs in 1960, by category:
Category
Avg. yearly inflation
$100 in 1921 →
All items (CPI-U)
1.30%
$165
Food
1.64%
$189
Apparel
0.82%
$138
Not shown because the BLS began these indexes after 1921: core (all items less food & energy) (1957–), energy (1957–), housing (1967–), medical care (1935–), transportation (1935–), recreation (1993–), education & communication (1993–).
Decade by decade: 1921 to 1960
Prices climbed fastest in the 1940s, averaging 5.58% a year, and fell in the 1930s (1.7% a year). Each step below chains into the full 1921–1960 change:
Years
Avg. yearly inflation
Price change
$100 from 1921, at end
1921–1930
-0.77%
-6.7%
$93.30
1930–1940
-1.75%
-16.2%
$78.21
1940–1950
5.58%
72.1%
$135
1950–1960
2.08%
22.8%
$165
Year by year: CPI and the value of $100 from 1921
$100 from 1921 had already become $82.12 by
1941, on its way to $165 in 1960; 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 9.9% in 1932, the deepest deflation of the period.
Long periods are sampled every 2 years; the calculator above covers any pair of years.
The destination year: 1960
In 1960, prices rose 1.7% and $100 from 1921 had the buying
power of $165; the year's average CPI of 29.6 is the level
behind every 1960 figure on this page.
Consumer prices rose 1.7% in 1960, up from 1959’s 0.7% even
as the economy slipped into recession that April, a downturn that would
prove the shortest since World War II. The year’s defining political
moment came that November, when John F. Kennedy narrowly defeated Richard
Nixon in one of the closest presidential elections in U.S. history,
decided by roughly two-tenths of a percentage point in the popular vote.
Television played a new role in the race: the first-ever televised
presidential debate that September, watched by an estimated 70 million
people, was widely seen as favoring the telegenic Kennedy. Civil rights
protest took a new form that February, when four Black freshmen at North
Carolina A&T State University sat down at a whites-only Woolworth’s lunch
counter in Greensboro and refused to leave; the sit-in tactic spread to
dozens of Southern cities within weeks. Cold War tensions flared that May,
when a Soviet missile downed an American U-2 spy plane deep inside Soviet
airspace. The pilot, Francis Gary Powers, was captured alive, embarrassing
the Eisenhower administration and collapsing a Paris summit called to ease
relations with Moscow. Consumer prices finished 1960 199.0% above their
1913 level. First-class postage held at 4 cents, and the
minimum wage stayed at $1.00 an hour.
MLA: “Inflation from 1921 to 1960: $100 is worth $165 today.” InflationCalculator.com, U.S. Bureau of Labor Statistics CPI-U data, https://inflationcalculator.com/inflation/1921-to-1960/
APA: InflationCalculator.com. Inflation from 1921 to 1960. Based on U.S. Bureau of Labor Statistics CPI-U data. Retrieved from https://inflationcalculator.com/inflation/1921-to-1960/