$100 in 1925 is worth $80.57 in 1938,
because prices declined 19.4% over that period, an average of
1.65% a year.
$100 in 1925 has
the same buying power as
$80.57
in 1938
Detailed inflation statistics
Cumulative price change
-19.4%
Average inflation rate
-1.65% per year
Converted amount ($100 base)
$80.57
Price difference ($100 base)
-$19.43
CPI in 1925
17.5
CPI in 1938
14.1
Inflation in 1925
2.34%
Inflation in 1938
-2.08%
$100 in 1925 → 1938
$80.57
$100 in 1938 → 1925
$124
What happened to prices between 1925 and 1938
Between 1925 and 1938, the Consumer Price Index went from 17.5 to 14.1.
Cumulatively, prices declined 19.4%, which works out to an average of
-1.65% per year. Put differently, a dollar in 1925 bought what
$1.24 buys in 1938: the 1925 dollar
gained 24.1% in purchasing power over
these 13 years.
Consumer prices rose 2.3% in 1925, the CPI’s largest single-year increase
since the deflationary swings of the early 1920s, though still mild next to
the double-digit inflation of the World War I years. The country’s cultural
fault lines were on full display that summer in Dayton, Tennessee, where
high school teacher John Scopes was tried July 10-21 for violating a state
law against teaching evolution, a case that drew national press coverage and
pitted prosecutor William Jennings Bryan against defense attorney Clarence
Darrow. Real estate speculation, meanwhile, peaked in Florida, where buyers
flipped undeveloped land in the Miami area on thin down payments, driving
prices far above what the land itself could support; the bubble would
collapse the following year. Detroit reshuffled that June too: Walter
Chrysler reorganized the struggling Maxwell Motor Company into Chrysler
Corporation, the start of what would become one of the American auto
industry’s “Big Three.” First-class postage held at 2 cents for the sixth
straight year.
Every 1925 amount converts to 1938 at the same ratio, 0.81: $1,000 becomes
$806, and $10,000 becomes $8,057.
Amount in 1925
Value in 1938
$1.00
$0.81
$5.00
$4.03
$10.00
$8.06
$20.00
$16.11
$50.00
$40.29
$100
$80.57
$500
$403
$1,000
$806
$5,000
$4,029
$10,000
$8,057
$100,000
$80,571
$1,000,000
$805,714
Inflation by spending category, 1925–1938
Every category fell between 1925 and 1938: food the most, down 26.7%, and apparel the least, down 16.7%. The headline number is an average; here is what $100 of 1925
spending costs in 1938, by category:
Category
Avg. yearly inflation
$100 in 1925 →
All items (CPI-U)
-1.65%
$80.57
Apparel
-1.40%
$83.27
Food
-2.36%
$73.33
Not shown because the BLS began these indexes after 1925: core (all items less food & energy) (1957–), energy (1957–), housing (1967–), medical care (1935–), transportation (1935–), recreation (1993–), education & communication (1993–).
Decade by decade: 1925 to 1938
Prices fell throughout this span: most slowly in the 1920s (0.9% a year) and fastest in the 1930s (2.1% a year). Each step below chains into the full 1925–1938 change:
Years
Avg. yearly inflation
Price change
$100 from 1925, at end
1925–1930
-0.93%
-4.6%
$95.43
1930–1938
-2.09%
-15.6%
$80.57
Year by year: CPI and the value of $100 from 1925
$100 from 1925 had already become $86.86 by
1931, on its way to $80.57 in 1938; each row shows the CPI, that
year's inflation rate, and the running value.
Within the span, inflation peaked at 3.6% in 1937, and prices fell 9.9% in 1932, the deepest deflation of the period.
In 1938, prices fell 2.1% and $100 from 1925 had the buying
power of $80.57; the year's average CPI of 14.1 is the level
behind every 1938 figure on this page.
Consumer prices fell 2.1% in 1938, reversing most of 1937’s
gain and interrupting four straight years of recovery from the Depression’s
trough. The National Bureau of Economic Research dates the bottom of the
downturn, which had begun that May, to June 1938, a sharp 13-month
contraction that briefly pushed unemployment back up near 19%. Even in a
year the economy was shrinking again, Congress passed one of the New Deal’s
most lasting reforms. The Fair Labor Standards Act, signed June 25 and
effective that October, established the first federal minimum wage, 25
cents an hour, capped the standard workweek at 44 hours with time-and-a-half
overtime beyond it, and restricted the employment of children in most
industries. The wage floor and hours limits applied only to workers engaged
in interstate commerce at first, but they set a precedent that would expand
in the decades that followed. Consumer prices stood 42.4% above their
1913 level and 17.5% below their 1929 peak, evidence of how
far the recovery still had to go even eight years after the Depression
began. First-class postage held at 3 cents.
MLA: “Inflation from 1925 to 1938: $100 is worth $80.57 today.” InflationCalculator.com, U.S. Bureau of Labor Statistics CPI-U data, https://inflationcalculator.com/inflation/1925-to-1938/
APA: InflationCalculator.com. Inflation from 1925 to 1938. Based on U.S. Bureau of Labor Statistics CPI-U data. Retrieved from https://inflationcalculator.com/inflation/1925-to-1938/