$100 in 1926 is worth $1,103 in 2005,
because prices increased 1003.4% over that period, an average of
3.09% a year.
$100 in 1926 has
the same buying power as
$1,103
in 2005
Detailed inflation statistics
Cumulative price change
1003.4%
Average inflation rate
3.09% per year
Converted amount ($100 base)
$1,103
Price difference ($100 base)
$1,003
CPI in 1926
17.7
CPI in 2005
195.3
Inflation in 1926
1.14%
Inflation in 2005
3.39%
$100 in 1926 → 2005
$1,103
$100 in 2005 → 1926
$9.06
What happened to prices between 1926 and 2005
Between 1926 and 2005, the Consumer Price Index went from 17.7 to 195.3.
Cumulatively, prices increased 1003.4%, which works out to an average of
3.09% per year. Put differently, a dollar in 1926 bought what
$0.09 buys in 2005: the 1926 dollar
lost 90.9% of its purchasing power over
these 79 years.
Consumer prices rose 1.1% in 1926, a third straight year of mild inflation
and part of the price stability that defined the middle of the decade.
Florida’s real estate boom, which had peaked the previous year on
speculative buying of undeveloped land, ended abruptly that September when
the Great Miami Hurricane made landfall near the city, killing hundreds and
wrecking the market for land whose value had rested on continued
speculation rather than anything underneath it. In Detroit, Henry Ford moved
his company to a five-day, 40-hour work week without cutting pay, a break
from the standard six-day schedule that other large employers would
gradually adopt over the following decades; Ford argued publicly that
workers with more leisure time would also become better customers for the
cars his factories built. Consumer prices remained low enough by historical
standards that a first-class stamp still cost just 2 cents, the same price
it had held since mid-1919.
Every 1926 amount converts to 2005 at the same ratio, 11.03: $1,000 becomes
$11,034, and $10,000 becomes $110,339.
Amount in 1926
Value in 2005
$1.00
$11.03
$5.00
$55.17
$10.00
$110
$20.00
$221
$50.00
$552
$100
$1,103
$500
$5,517
$1,000
$11,034
$5,000
$55,169
$10,000
$110,339
$100,000
$1,103,390
$1,000,000
$11,033,898
Inflation by spending category, 1926–2005
Between 1926 and 2005, food rose the most, up 1021.8%, while apparel rose the least, up 361.4%, against 1003.4% for all items. The headline number is an average; here is what $100 of 1926
spending costs in 2005, by category:
Category
Avg. yearly inflation
$100 in 1926 →
All items (CPI-U)
3.09%
$1,103
Food
3.11%
$1,122
Apparel
1.95%
$461
Not shown because the BLS began these indexes after 1926: core (all items less food & energy) (1957–), energy (1957–), housing (1967–), medical care (1935–), transportation (1935–), recreation (1993–), education & communication (1993–).
Decade by decade: 1926 to 2005
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 1926–2005 change:
Years
Avg. yearly inflation
Price change
$100 from 1926, at end
1926–1930
-1.44%
-5.6%
$94.35
1930–1940
-1.75%
-16.2%
$79.10
1940–1950
5.58%
72.1%
$136
1950–1960
2.08%
22.8%
$167
1960–1970
2.74%
31.1%
$219
1970–1980
7.82%
112.4%
$466
1980–1990
4.72%
58.6%
$738
1990–2000
2.80%
31.8%
$973
2000–2005
2.55%
13.4%
$1,103
Year by year: CPI and the value of $100 from 1926
$100 from 1926 had already become $183 by
1966, on its way to $1,103 in 2005; 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: 2005
In 2005, prices rose 3.4% and $100 from 1926 had the buying
power of $1,103; the year's average CPI of 195.3 is the level
behind every 2005 figure on this page.
Inflation rose to 3.4% in 2005, up from 2.7% in 2004, as gasoline averaged $2.30 a gallon,
compared with $1.88 the year before. Hurricane Katrina made landfall on August 29, and with
Hurricane Rita weeks later it disrupted Gulf Coast refining, pushing the national average
price past $3 in early September. The Federal Reserve raised its policy rate at every meeting,
from 2.25% to 4.25%, to keep energy costs from feeding into other prices. The median household
earned about $46,300, up 4.5% from 2004, but the median new home price rose a further 9%, to
$240,900. In April, Congress passed a bankruptcy law that made it harder to clear debts. A
first-class stamp stayed at 37 cents until January 2006, and the federal minimum wage stayed
at $5.15.
MLA: “Inflation from 1926 to 2005: $100 is worth $1,103 today.” InflationCalculator.com, U.S. Bureau of Labor Statistics CPI-U data, https://inflationcalculator.com/inflation/1926-to-2005/
APA: InflationCalculator.com. Inflation from 1926 to 2005. Based on U.S. Bureau of Labor Statistics CPI-U data. Retrieved from https://inflationcalculator.com/inflation/1926-to-2005/