$100 in 1929 is worth $725 in 1989,
because prices increased 625.1% over that period, an average of
3.36% a year.
$100 in 1929 has
the same buying power as
$725
in 1989
Detailed inflation statistics
Cumulative price change
625.1%
Average inflation rate
3.36% per year
Converted amount ($100 base)
$725
Price difference ($100 base)
$625
CPI in 1929
17.1
CPI in 1989
124
Inflation in 1929
0.00%
Inflation in 1989
4.82%
$100 in 1929 → 1989
$725
$100 in 1989 → 1929
$13.79
What happened to prices between 1929 and 1989
Between 1929 and 1989, the Consumer Price Index went from 17.1 to 124.
Cumulatively, prices increased 625.1%, which works out to an average of
3.36% per year. Put differently, a dollar in 1929 bought what
$0.14 buys in 1989: the 1929 dollar
lost 86.2% of its purchasing power over
these 60 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 1989 at the same ratio, 7.25: $1,000 becomes
$7,251, and $10,000 becomes $72,515.
Amount in 1929
Value in 1989
$1.00
$7.25
$5.00
$36.26
$10.00
$72.51
$20.00
$145
$50.00
$363
$100
$725
$500
$3,626
$1,000
$7,251
$5,000
$36,257
$10,000
$72,515
$100,000
$725,146
$1,000,000
$7,251,462
Inflation by spending category, 1929–1989
Between 1929 and 1989, food rose the most, up 658.2%, while apparel rose the least, up 380.2%, against 625.1% for all items. The headline number is an average; here is what $100 of 1929
spending costs in 1989, by category:
Category
Avg. yearly inflation
$100 in 1929 →
All items (CPI-U)
3.36%
$725
Food
3.43%
$758
Apparel
2.65%
$480
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 1989
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 1929–1989 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
1980–1989
4.65%
50.5%
$725
Year by year: CPI and the value of $100 from 1929
$100 from 1929 had already become $170 by
1959, on its way to $725 in 1989; 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: 1989
In 1989, prices rose 4.8% and $100 from 1929 had the buying
power of $725; the year's average CPI of 124 is the level
behind every 1989 figure on this page.
1989 closed out a decade that began in economic crisis and ended in a long,
calmer expansion. Inflation for the year came in at 4.8%, higher than the
mid-decade lull but still roughly a third of the 13.5% peak that had opened
the decade in 1980. The federal minimum wage, unchanged at $3.35 an hour
since January 1981, had gone longer without an increase than at any point
since Congress created it, and had lost close to a third of its purchasing
power to inflation in the meantime; lawmakers would finally raise it to
$3.80 the following April. The decade’s other unfinished business came due
in August, when Congress passed FIRREA, the law that created the Resolution
Trust Corporation to seize and sell off the hundreds of savings and loan
institutions that a decade of deregulation and risky lending had left
insolvent, a bailout that eventually cost taxpayers over $100 billion. On
Wall Street, the recovery was already complete: the Dow Jones Industrial
Average closed 1989 at a record high, just over two years after Black
Monday’s 22.6% single-day crash, capping the bull market that had begun at
the Dow’s 776 low in August 1982. Between the S&L bailout, a wage floor
eroded by years without a raise, and a stock market at new highs, 1989
captured how unevenly the decade’s disinflation had been felt.
MLA: “Inflation from 1929 to 1989: $100 is worth $725 today.” InflationCalculator.com, U.S. Bureau of Labor Statistics CPI-U data, https://inflationcalculator.com/inflation/1929-to-1989/
APA: InflationCalculator.com. Inflation from 1929 to 1989. Based on U.S. Bureau of Labor Statistics CPI-U data. Retrieved from https://inflationcalculator.com/inflation/1929-to-1989/