$100 in 1929 is worth $692 in 1988,
because prices increased 591.8% over that period, an average of
3.33% a year.
$100 in 1929 has
the same buying power as
$692
in 1988
Detailed inflation statistics
Cumulative price change
591.8%
Average inflation rate
3.33% per year
Converted amount ($100 base)
$692
Price difference ($100 base)
$592
CPI in 1929
17.1
CPI in 1988
118.3
Inflation in 1929
0.00%
Inflation in 1988
4.14%
$100 in 1929 → 1988
$692
$100 in 1988 → 1929
$14.45
What happened to prices between 1929 and 1988
Between 1929 and 1988, the Consumer Price Index went from 17.1 to 118.3.
Cumulatively, prices increased 591.8%, which works out to an average of
3.33% per year. Put differently, a dollar in 1929 bought what
$0.14 buys in 1988: the 1929 dollar
lost 85.5% of its purchasing power over
these 59 years.
Consumer prices were unchanged in 1929, the CPI’s annual average flat for
the second time in six years and a fitting close to a decade that began with
wartime inflation and ended in rough price stability. By year’s end the
index stood 14.5% below its 1920 peak and roughly 73% above its
1913 starting point, a reminder that even a “stable” decade
left prices well above where they had started. The stability in the cost of
living masked what was building in financial markets. The National Bureau
of Economic Research dates the start of the Great Depression to that
August, the month the business cycle peaked, months before most Americans
noticed anything was wrong. The break came that October: panic selling hit
Wall Street on Black Thursday, October 24, and returned even worse on Black
Tuesday, October 29, when the Dow Jones Industrial Average fell about 12% in
a single session. Billions of dollars in paper wealth disappeared within
days, and the crash marked the start of a downturn that would pull consumer
prices into their steepest sustained decline of the 20th century over the
next four years. First-class postage was still 2 cents, a price that would
hold until 1932.
Every 1929 amount converts to 1988 at the same ratio, 6.92: $1,000 becomes
$6,918, and $10,000 becomes $69,181.
Amount in 1929
Value in 1988
$1.00
$6.92
$5.00
$34.59
$10.00
$69.18
$20.00
$138
$50.00
$346
$100
$692
$500
$3,459
$1,000
$6,918
$5,000
$34,591
$10,000
$69,181
$100,000
$691,813
$1,000,000
$6,918,129
Inflation by spending category, 1929–1988
Between 1929 and 1988, food rose the most, up 616.4%, while apparel rose the least, up 367.2%, against 591.8% for all items. The headline number is an average; here is what $100 of 1929
spending costs in 1988, by category:
Category
Avg. yearly inflation
$100 in 1929 →
All items (CPI-U)
3.33%
$692
Food
3.39%
$716
Apparel
2.65%
$467
Not shown because the BLS began these indexes after 1929: core (all items less food & energy) (1957–), energy (1957–), housing (1967–), medical care (1935–), transportation (1935–), recreation (1993–), education & communication (1993–).
Decade by decade: 1929 to 1988
Prices climbed fastest in the 1970s, averaging 7.82% a year, and fell in the 1920s (2.3% a year). Each step below chains into the full 1929–1988 change:
Years
Avg. yearly inflation
Price change
$100 from 1929, at end
1929–1930
-2.34%
-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
1980–1988
4.62%
43.6%
$692
Year by year: CPI and the value of $100 from 1929
$100 from 1929 had already become $170 by
1959, on its way to $692 in 1988; 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: 1988
In 1988, prices rose 4.1% and $100 from 1929 had the buying
power of $692; the year's average CPI of 118.3 is the level
behind every 1988 figure on this page.
By 1988, the economic expansion that began in the ashes of the 1981-82
recession was in its sixth year, and the Federal Reserve was watching for
signs it had run too long. Inflation rose to 4.1%, up from 3.6% the year
before, while unemployment fell to its lowest level since 1974. Alan
Greenspan’s Fed responded by raising the federal funds rate through the
year, from about 6.5% to 8.5%, trying to cool demand before prices
accelerated the way they had in the 1970s. Households still felt the
difference between this expansion and the last one: gas held near 90 cents
a gallon, almost exactly its 1987 price, and median household income rose
to roughly $27,200. The one price that moved was postage, which rose from
22 to 25 cents in April, the fourth increase of the decade but a far
gentler pace than the string of increases in the late 1970s and early
1980s. In November, Vice President George H.W. Bush won the presidency on
the strength of the expansion, promising in his nomination speech to hold
the line on taxes. Both the boom and that pledge would run into trouble
within two years, as the Fed’s rate increases helped tip the economy toward
the 1990-91 recession.
MLA: “Inflation from 1929 to 1988: $100 is worth $692 today.” InflationCalculator.com, U.S. Bureau of Labor Statistics CPI-U data, https://inflationcalculator.com/inflation/1929-to-1988/
APA: InflationCalculator.com. Inflation from 1929 to 1988. Based on U.S. Bureau of Labor Statistics CPI-U data. Retrieved from https://inflationcalculator.com/inflation/1929-to-1988/