$100 in 1923 is worth $102 in 1927,
because prices increased 1.8% over that period, an average of
0.44% a year.
$100 in 1923 has
the same buying power as
$102
in 1927
Detailed inflation statistics
Cumulative price change
1.8%
Average inflation rate
0.44% per year
Converted amount ($100 base)
$102
Price difference ($100 base)
$1.75
CPI in 1923
17.1
CPI in 1927
17.4
Inflation in 1923
1.79%
Inflation in 1927
-1.69%
$100 in 1923 → 1927
$102
$100 in 1927 → 1923
$98.28
What happened to prices between 1923 and 1927
Between 1923 and 1927, the Consumer Price Index went from 17.1 to 17.4.
Cumulatively, prices increased 1.8%, which works out to an average of
0.44% per year. Put differently, a dollar in 1923 bought what
$0.98 buys in 1927: the 1923 dollar
lost 1.7% of its purchasing power over
these 4 years.
Consumer prices rose 1.8% in 1923, the first increase since 1920 and a sign
the postwar deflation had run its course; the economy settled into the
steadier growth that defined much of the rest of the decade. The year’s
biggest shock was political rather than economic: Warren Harding died August
2 in San Francisco while returning from a trip to Alaska, and Vice President
Calvin Coolidge was sworn in the next day at his family’s farmhouse in
Plymouth Notch, Vermont, administered the oath of office by his own father,
a notary public, by lamplight. Coolidge would go on to preside over the low,
stable inflation of the “Roaring Twenties.” The contrast with Germany that
year was stark. The Weimar Republic’s currency collapse reached its peak in
November 1923, with prices doubling every few days and a loaf of bread
costing billions of marks; Germany introduced a new currency, the
Rentenmark, that month to halt the spiral. U.S. consumer prices, by
comparison, had moved in single digits or held flat every year since 1921, a
gap that shaped how American economists would later think about what made
the postwar inflation of Europe so different from the mild swings at home.
First-class postage stayed at 2 cents.
Every 1923 amount converts to 1927 at the same ratio, 1.02: $1,000 becomes
$1,018, and $10,000 becomes $10,175.
Amount in 1923
Value in 1927
$1.00
$1.02
$5.00
$5.09
$10.00
$10.18
$20.00
$20.35
$50.00
$50.88
$100
$102
$500
$509
$1,000
$1,018
$5,000
$5,088
$10,000
$10,175
$100,000
$101,754
$1,000,000
$1,017,544
Inflation by spending category, 1923–1927
Between 1923 and 1927, food rose the most, up 6.5%, while apparel fell 6.6%, against 1.8% for all items. The headline number is an average; here is what $100 of 1923
spending costs in 1927, by category:
Category
Avg. yearly inflation
$100 in 1923 →
All items (CPI-U)
0.44%
$102
Food
1.59%
$106
Apparel
-1.70%
$93.36
Not shown because the BLS began these indexes after 1923: 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 1923
$100 from 1923 had already become $102 by
1925, on its way to $102 in 1927; 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 1927, the deepest deflation of the period.
In 1927, prices fell 1.7% and $100 from 1923 had the buying
power of $102; the year's average CPI of 17.4 is the level
behind every 1927 figure on this page.
Consumer prices fell 1.7% in 1927, a mild retreat after three years of
gradual increases and part of a shallow up-and-down pattern that ran through
the second half of the decade. Aviation delivered the year’s signature
moment: Charles Lindbergh departed Roosevelt Field, New York, on May 20 and
landed at Le Bourget Field outside Paris roughly 33.5 hours later, the first
person to fly the Atlantic solo and nonstop. Detroit closed a chapter of its
own that May, when Ford halted the Model T’s production line after nearly 19
years and more than 15 million cars sold, idling tens of thousands of
workers while its factories retooled for the Model A. The Federal Reserve,
meeting with European central bankers that summer, cut its discount rate to
ease pressure on currencies still recovering from the war, a move later
cited by economists including Milton Friedman and Anna Schwartz as fuel for
the stock market speculation that built through the following two years.
First-class postage held at 2 cents.
MLA: “Inflation from 1923 to 1927: $100 is worth $102 today.” InflationCalculator.com, U.S. Bureau of Labor Statistics CPI-U data, https://inflationcalculator.com/inflation/1923-to-1927/
APA: InflationCalculator.com. Inflation from 1923 to 1927. Based on U.S. Bureau of Labor Statistics CPI-U data. Retrieved from https://inflationcalculator.com/inflation/1923-to-1927/