$100 in 1923 is worth $1,052 in 2002,
because prices increased 952.0% over that period, an average of
3.02% a year.
$100 in 1923 has
the same buying power as
$1,052
in 2002
Detailed inflation statistics
Cumulative price change
952.0%
Average inflation rate
3.02% per year
Converted amount ($100 base)
$1,052
Price difference ($100 base)
$952
CPI in 1923
17.1
CPI in 2002
179.9
Inflation in 1923
1.79%
Inflation in 2002
1.58%
$100 in 1923 → 2002
$1,052
$100 in 2002 → 1923
$9.51
What happened to prices between 1923 and 2002
Between 1923 and 2002, the Consumer Price Index went from 17.1 to 179.9.
Cumulatively, prices increased 952.0%, which works out to an average of
3.02% per year. Put differently, a dollar in 1923 bought what
$0.10 buys in 2002: the 1923 dollar
lost 90.5% of its purchasing power over
these 79 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 2002 at the same ratio, 10.52: $1,000 becomes
$10,520, and $10,000 becomes $105,205.
Amount in 1923
Value in 2002
$1.00
$10.52
$5.00
$52.60
$10.00
$105
$20.00
$210
$50.00
$526
$100
$1,052
$500
$5,260
$1,000
$10,520
$5,000
$52,602
$10,000
$105,205
$100,000
$1,052,047
$1,000,000
$10,520,468
Inflation by spending category, 1923–2002
Between 1923 and 2002, food rose the most, up 1044.2%, while apparel rose the least, up 357.6%, against 952.0% for all items. The headline number is an average; here is what $100 of 1923
spending costs in 2002, by category:
Category
Avg. yearly inflation
$100 in 1923 →
All items (CPI-U)
3.02%
$1,052
Food
3.13%
$1,144
Apparel
1.94%
$458
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–).
Decade by decade: 1923 to 2002
Prices climbed fastest in the 1970s, averaging 7.82% a year, and fell in the 1930s (1.7% a year). Each step below chains into the full 1923–2002 change:
Years
Avg. yearly inflation
Price change
$100 from 1923, at end
1923–1930
-0.34%
-2.3%
$97.66
1930–1940
-1.75%
-16.2%
$81.87
1940–1950
5.58%
72.1%
$141
1950–1960
2.08%
22.8%
$173
1960–1970
2.74%
31.1%
$227
1970–1980
7.82%
112.4%
$482
1980–1990
4.72%
58.6%
$764
1990–2000
2.80%
31.8%
$1,007
2000–2002
2.21%
4.5%
$1,052
Year by year: CPI and the value of $100 from 1923
$100 from 1923 had already become $179 by
1963, on its way to $1,052 in 2002; 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 5 years; the calculator above covers any pair of years.
The destination year: 2002
In 2002, prices rose 1.6% and $100 from 1923 had the buying
power of $1,052; the year's average CPI of 179.9 is the level
behind every 2002 figure on this page.
The CPI rose 1.6% in 2002, the lowest annual rate of the decade so far, with gasoline down to an
average of $1.36 a gallon and slack in the labor market keeping wage pressure low. The median
household earned about $42,400, and a new home cost roughly $187,600, an increase of about 7%
from the year before as low mortgage rates began to lift housing. The Federal Reserve cut its
policy rate to 1.25% in November. Stocks were moving the other way: after the Enron and WorldCom
scandals, the S&P 500 hit its bear-market low on October 9, about 49% below its March 2000
peak, and Congress passed the Sarbanes-Oxley Act in July to tighten corporate accounting rules.
On January 1, euro banknotes and coins replaced national currencies in 12 European countries. A
first-class stamp rose to 37 cents in June, and the federal minimum wage stayed at $5.15.
MLA: “Inflation from 1923 to 2002: $100 is worth $1,052 today.” InflationCalculator.com, U.S. Bureau of Labor Statistics CPI-U data, https://inflationcalculator.com/inflation/1923-to-2002/
APA: InflationCalculator.com. Inflation from 1923 to 2002. Based on U.S. Bureau of Labor Statistics CPI-U data. Retrieved from https://inflationcalculator.com/inflation/1923-to-2002/