$100 in 1925 is worth $175 in 1963,
because prices increased 74.9% over that period, an average of
1.48% a year.
$100 in 1925 has
the same buying power as
$175
in 1963
Detailed inflation statistics
Cumulative price change
74.9%
Average inflation rate
1.48% per year
Converted amount ($100 base)
$175
Price difference ($100 base)
$74.86
CPI in 1925
17.5
CPI in 1963
30.6
Inflation in 1925
2.34%
Inflation in 1963
1.32%
$100 in 1925 → 1963
$175
$100 in 1963 → 1925
$57.19
What happened to prices between 1925 and 1963
Between 1925 and 1963, the Consumer Price Index went from 17.5 to 30.6.
Cumulatively, prices increased 74.9%, which works out to an average of
1.48% per year. Put differently, a dollar in 1925 bought what
$0.57 buys in 1963: the 1925 dollar
lost 42.8% of its purchasing power over
these 38 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 1963 at the same ratio, 1.75: $1,000 becomes
$1,749, and $10,000 becomes $17,486.
Amount in 1925
Value in 1963
$1.00
$1.75
$5.00
$8.74
$10.00
$17.49
$20.00
$34.97
$50.00
$87.43
$100
$175
$500
$874
$1,000
$1,749
$5,000
$8,743
$10,000
$17,486
$100,000
$174,857
$1,000,000
$1,748,571
Inflation by spending category, 1925–1963
Between 1925 and 1963, food rose the most, up 88.5%, while apparel rose the least, up 78.3%, against 74.9% for all items. The headline number is an average; here is what $100 of 1925
spending costs in 1963, by category:
Category
Avg. yearly inflation
$100 in 1925 →
All items (CPI-U)
1.48%
$175
Food
1.68%
$188
Apparel
1.53%
$178
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 1963
Prices climbed fastest in the 1940s, averaging 5.58% a year, and fell in the 1930s (1.7% a year). Each step below chains into the full 1925–1963 change:
Years
Avg. yearly inflation
Price change
$100 from 1925, at end
1925–1930
-0.93%
-4.6%
$95.43
1930–1940
-1.75%
-16.2%
$80.00
1940–1950
5.58%
72.1%
$138
1950–1960
2.08%
22.8%
$169
1960–1963
1.11%
3.4%
$175
Year by year: CPI and the value of $100 from 1925
$100 from 1925 had already become $98.86 by
1943, on its way to $175 in 1963; 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 2 years; the calculator above covers any pair of years.
The destination year: 1963
In 1963, prices rose 1.3% and $100 from 1925 had the buying
power of $175; the year's average CPI of 30.6 is the level
behind every 1963 figure on this page.
Consumer prices rose 1.3% in 1963, up slightly from 1962’s
1.0% as the expansion entered its third year with inflation still low,
conditions that gave Kennedy room to push the large tax cut he had
proposed to Congress. The cost of a first-class stamp rose that January
7, to 5 cents from 4 cents, the first postal rate change since 1958. That
August 28, Martin Luther King Jr. delivered his “I Have a Dream” speech
from the steps of the Lincoln Memorial to a quarter million people
gathered for the March on Washington, building pressure on Congress to
pass the civil rights bill Kennedy had proposed that June. The year ended
in tragedy: Kennedy was assassinated while riding in a motorcade through
Dallas on November 22, and Lyndon B. Johnson was sworn in aboard Air Force
One that same afternoon. Johnson would spend the following year pushing
Kennedy’s stalled tax and civil rights agenda through Congress. The
minimum wage rose again that September, to $1.25 an hour, the second step
of the phased increase set two years earlier. Consumer prices finished
1963 209.1% above their 1913 level.
MLA: “Inflation from 1925 to 1963: $100 is worth $175 today.” InflationCalculator.com, U.S. Bureau of Labor Statistics CPI-U data, https://inflationcalculator.com/inflation/1925-to-1963/
APA: InflationCalculator.com. Inflation from 1925 to 1963. Based on U.S. Bureau of Labor Statistics CPI-U data. Retrieved from https://inflationcalculator.com/inflation/1925-to-1963/