$100 in 1923 is worth $1,255 in 2009,
because prices increased 1154.6% over that period, an average of
2.98% a year.
$100 in 1923 has
the same buying power as
$1,255
in 2009
Detailed inflation statistics
Cumulative price change
1154.6%
Average inflation rate
2.98% per year
Converted amount ($100 base)
$1,255
Price difference ($100 base)
$1,155
CPI in 1923
17.1
CPI in 2009
214.537
Inflation in 1923
1.79%
Inflation in 2009
-0.36%
$100 in 1923 → 2009
$1,255
$100 in 2009 → 1923
$7.97
What happened to prices between 1923 and 2009
Between 1923 and 2009, the Consumer Price Index went from 17.1 to 214.537.
Cumulatively, prices increased 1154.6%, which works out to an average of
2.98% per year. Put differently, a dollar in 1923 bought what
$0.08 buys in 2009: the 1923 dollar
lost 92.0% of its purchasing power over
these 86 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 2009 at the same ratio, 12.55: $1,000 becomes
$12,546, and $10,000 becomes $125,460.
Amount in 1923
Value in 2009
$1.00
$12.55
$5.00
$62.73
$10.00
$125
$20.00
$251
$50.00
$627
$100
$1,255
$500
$6,273
$1,000
$12,546
$5,000
$62,730
$10,000
$125,460
$100,000
$1,254,602
$1,000,000
$12,546,023
Inflation by spending category, 1923–2009
Between 1923 and 2009, food rose the most, up 1315.3%, while apparel rose the least, up 343.1%, against 1154.6% for all items. The headline number is an average; here is what $100 of 1923
spending costs in 2009, by category:
Category
Avg. yearly inflation
$100 in 1923 →
All items (CPI-U)
2.98%
$1,255
Food
3.13%
$1,415
Apparel
1.75%
$443
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 2009
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 1923–2009 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
2000–2009
2.47%
24.6%
$1,255
Year by year: CPI and the value of $100 from 1923
$100 from 1923 had already become $204 by
1968, on its way to $1,255 in 2009; 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: 2009
In 2009, prices fell 0.4% and $100 from 1923 had the buying
power of $1,255; the year's average CPI of 214.537 is the level
behind every 2009 figure on this page.
2009 is the rarest kind of year in the modern price data: one where the cost
of living went down. The CPI fell 0.4%, the first full-year deflation
since 1955, as the Great Recession hollowed out demand and oil unwound from
its $147 spike the summer before. Gasoline that had cost over $4 a gallon in
July 2008 averaged $2.35 in 2009, and that energy collapse dragged the
12-month inflation rate to −2.1% by July, the deepest reading since 1950.
Policymakers treated falling prices not as relief but as a warning: deflation
raises the real weight of debt precisely when households are drowning in it,
which is why the Federal Reserve pinned interest rates near zero, began buying
bonds by the hundreds of billions, and Washington passed a $787 billion
stimulus. The medicine took: prices stabilized within a year, and 2009 remains
the textbook case of why central banks fear deflation more than moderate
inflation.
MLA: “Inflation from 1923 to 2009: $100 is worth $1,255 today.” InflationCalculator.com, U.S. Bureau of Labor Statistics CPI-U data, https://inflationcalculator.com/inflation/1923-to-2009/
APA: InflationCalculator.com. Inflation from 1923 to 2009. Based on U.S. Bureau of Labor Statistics CPI-U data. Retrieved from https://inflationcalculator.com/inflation/1923-to-2009/