$100 in 1923 is worth $1,315 in 2011,
because prices increased 1215.4% over that period, an average of
2.97% a year.
$100 in 1923 has
the same buying power as
$1,315
in 2011
Detailed inflation statistics
Cumulative price change
1215.4%
Average inflation rate
2.97% per year
Converted amount ($100 base)
$1,315
Price difference ($100 base)
$1,215
CPI in 1923
17.1
CPI in 2011
224.939
Inflation in 1923
1.79%
Inflation in 2011
3.16%
$100 in 1923 → 2011
$1,315
$100 in 2011 → 1923
$7.60
What happened to prices between 1923 and 2011
Between 1923 and 2011, the Consumer Price Index went from 17.1 to 224.939.
Cumulatively, prices increased 1215.4%, which works out to an average of
2.97% per year. Put differently, a dollar in 1923 bought what
$0.08 buys in 2011: the 1923 dollar
lost 92.4% of its purchasing power over
these 88 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 2011 at the same ratio, 13.15: $1,000 becomes
$13,154, and $10,000 becomes $131,543.
Amount in 1923
Value in 2011
$1.00
$13.15
$5.00
$65.77
$10.00
$132
$20.00
$263
$50.00
$658
$100
$1,315
$500
$6,577
$1,000
$13,154
$5,000
$65,772
$10,000
$131,543
$100,000
$1,315,433
$1,000,000
$13,154,327
Inflation by spending category, 1923–2011
Between 1923 and 2011, food rose the most, up 1379.5%, while apparel rose the least, up 350.6%, against 1215.4% for all items. The headline number is an average; here is what $100 of 1923
spending costs in 2011, by category:
Category
Avg. yearly inflation
$100 in 1923 →
All items (CPI-U)
2.97%
$1,315
Food
3.11%
$1,479
Apparel
1.73%
$451
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 2011
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 1923–2011 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
2000–2010
2.39%
26.6%
$1,275
2010–2011
3.16%
3.2%
$1,315
Year by year: CPI and the value of $100 from 1923
$100 from 1923 had already become $204 by
1968, on its way to $1,315 in 2011; 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: 2011
In 2011, prices rose 3.2% and $100 from 1923 had the buying
power of $1,315; the year's average CPI of 224.939 is the level
behind every 2011 figure on this page.
2011 brought the fastest inflation of the post-recession recovery. Consumer
prices rose 3.2%, roughly double the 2010 pace, and the cause was mostly at the
pump and the grocery store. Unrest across the Middle East and North Africa,
including the war in Libya, pushed gasoline to an annual average of $3.52 a
gallon, the highest yearly figure recorded to that point. Food prices also
rose faster than the overall index.
Household budgets did not keep up. The median household income was $50,054,
barely above the year before, and the median new home sold for about $227,200.
The federal minimum wage stayed at $7.25 and a first-class stamp at 44 cents.
Policy stayed loose. The Federal Reserve kept its policy rate near zero and
launched Operation Twist in September to lower long-term rates. Washington
spent the summer in a debt-ceiling fight that ended in S&P’s August downgrade
of the U.S. credit rating. The inflation spike proved temporary: the
2011 rate was the high point of the early 2010s, and prices grew more slowly
in every year that followed until 2017.
MLA: “Inflation from 1923 to 2011: $100 is worth $1,315 today.” InflationCalculator.com, U.S. Bureau of Labor Statistics CPI-U data, https://inflationcalculator.com/inflation/1923-to-2011/
APA: InflationCalculator.com. Inflation from 1923 to 2011. Based on U.S. Bureau of Labor Statistics CPI-U data. Retrieved from https://inflationcalculator.com/inflation/1923-to-2011/