$100 in 1922 is worth $102 in 1929,
because prices increased 1.8% over that period, an average of
0.25% a year.
$100 in 1922 has
the same buying power as
$102
in 1929
Detailed inflation statistics
Cumulative price change
1.8%
Average inflation rate
0.25% per year
Converted amount ($100 base)
$102
Price difference ($100 base)
$1.79
CPI in 1922
16.8
CPI in 1929
17.1
Inflation in 1922
-6.15%
Inflation in 1929
0.00%
$100 in 1922 → 1929
$102
$100 in 1929 → 1922
$98.25
What happened to prices between 1922 and 1929
Between 1922 and 1929, the Consumer Price Index went from 16.8 to 17.1.
Cumulatively, prices increased 1.8%, which works out to an average of
0.25% per year. Put differently, a dollar in 1922 bought what
$0.98 buys in 1929: the 1922 dollar
lost 1.8% of its purchasing power over
these 7 years.
Consumer prices fell another 6.1% in 1922, the second straight year of
decline, even as the broader economy climbed out of the Depression of
1920-21 and industrial production rebounded. The CPI had now given back
roughly a third of its wartime runup, though it stayed well above the
1913 baseline. Congress moved to shield that recovery from
foreign competition: the Fordney-McCumber Tariff Act, signed September 21,
raised duties on hundreds of imported goods to some of the highest levels in
U.S. history, a policy meant to protect farmers and manufacturers still
adjusting to postwar prices. Labor tension flared even as prices fell.
Roughly half a million bituminous coal miners struck that April over wage
cuts employers had imposed as prices dropped, and hundreds of thousands of
railroad shop workers walked out in July in a separate dispute over pay and
work rules, together the largest strike wave since 1919. Both disputes
dragged on for months and drew federal mediation before ending without full
concessions for the workers. First-class postage remained at 2 cents.
Every 1922 amount converts to 1929 at the same ratio, 1.02: $1,000 becomes
$1,018, and $10,000 becomes $10,179.
Amount in 1922
Value in 1929
$1.00
$1.02
$5.00
$5.09
$10.00
$10.18
$20.00
$20.36
$50.00
$50.89
$100
$102
$500
$509
$1,000
$1,018
$5,000
$5,089
$10,000
$10,179
$100,000
$101,786
$1,000,000
$1,017,857
Inflation by spending category, 1922–1929
Between 1922 and 1929, food rose the most, up 10.7%, while apparel fell 8.5%, against 1.8% for all items. The headline number is an average; here is what $100 of 1922
spending costs in 1929, by category:
Category
Avg. yearly inflation
$100 in 1922 →
All items (CPI-U)
0.25%
$102
Food
1.47%
$111
Apparel
-1.26%
$91.48
Not shown because the BLS began these indexes after 1922: core (all items less food & energy) (1957–), energy (1957–), housing (1967–), medical care (1935–), transportation (1935–), recreation (1993–), education & communication (1993–).
Year by year: CPI and the value of $100 from 1922
$100 from 1922 had already become $104 by
1925, on its way to $102 in 1929; each row shows the CPI, that
year's inflation rate, and the running value.
Within the span, inflation peaked at 2.3% in 1925, and prices fell 1.7% in 1928, the deepest deflation of the period.
In 1929, prices rose 0.0% and $100 from 1922 had the buying
power of $102; the year's average CPI of 17.1 is the level
behind every 1929 figure on this page.
Consumer prices were unchanged in 1929, the CPI’s annual average flat for
the second time in six years and a fitting close to a decade that began with
wartime inflation and ended in rough price stability. By year’s end the
index stood 14.5% below its 1920 peak and roughly 73% above its
1913 starting point, a reminder that even a “stable” decade
left prices well above where they had started. The stability in the cost of
living masked what was building in financial markets. The National Bureau
of Economic Research dates the start of the Great Depression to that
August, the month the business cycle peaked, months before most Americans
noticed anything was wrong. The break came that October: panic selling hit
Wall Street on Black Thursday, October 24, and returned even worse on Black
Tuesday, October 29, when the Dow Jones Industrial Average fell about 12% in
a single session. Billions of dollars in paper wealth disappeared within
days, and the crash marked the start of a downturn that would pull consumer
prices into their steepest sustained decline of the 20th century over the
next four years. First-class postage was still 2 cents, a price that would
hold until 1932.
MLA: “Inflation from 1922 to 1929: $100 is worth $102 today.” InflationCalculator.com, U.S. Bureau of Labor Statistics CPI-U data, https://inflationcalculator.com/inflation/1922-to-1929/
APA: InflationCalculator.com. Inflation from 1922 to 1929. Based on U.S. Bureau of Labor Statistics CPI-U data. Retrieved from https://inflationcalculator.com/inflation/1922-to-1929/