$100 in 1929 is worth $1,386 in 2015,
because prices increased 1286.1% over that period, an average of
3.10% a year.
$100 in 1929 has
the same buying power as
$1,386
in 2015
Detailed inflation statistics
Cumulative price change
1286.1%
Average inflation rate
3.10% per year
Converted amount ($100 base)
$1,386
Price difference ($100 base)
$1,286
CPI in 1929
17.1
CPI in 2015
237.017
Inflation in 1929
0.00%
Inflation in 2015
0.12%
$100 in 1929 → 2015
$1,386
$100 in 2015 → 1929
$7.21
What happened to prices between 1929 and 2015
Between 1929 and 2015, the Consumer Price Index went from 17.1 to 237.017.
Cumulatively, prices increased 1286.1%, which works out to an average of
3.10% per year. Put differently, a dollar in 1929 bought what
$0.07 buys in 2015: the 1929 dollar
lost 92.8% of its purchasing power over
these 86 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 2015 at the same ratio, 13.86: $1,000 becomes
$13,861, and $10,000 becomes $138,606.
Amount in 1929
Value in 2015
$1.00
$13.86
$5.00
$69.30
$10.00
$139
$20.00
$277
$50.00
$693
$100
$1,386
$500
$6,930
$1,000
$13,861
$5,000
$69,303
$10,000
$138,606
$100,000
$1,386,064
$1,000,000
$13,860,643
Inflation by spending category, 1929–2015
Between 1929 and 2015, food rose the most, up 1398.4%, while apparel rose the least, up 409.7%, against 1286.1% for all items. The headline number is an average; here is what $100 of 1929
spending costs in 2015, by category:
Category
Avg. yearly inflation
$100 in 1929 →
All items (CPI-U)
3.10%
$1,386
Food
3.20%
$1,498
Apparel
1.91%
$510
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 2015
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 1929–2015 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
1980–1990
4.72%
58.6%
$764
1990–2000
2.80%
31.8%
$1,007
2000–2010
2.39%
26.6%
$1,275
2010–2015
1.68%
8.7%
$1,386
Year by year: CPI and the value of $100 from 1929
$100 from 1929 had already become $288 by
1974, on its way to $1,386 in 2015; 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: 2015
In 2015, prices rose 0.1% and $100 from 1929 had the buying
power of $1,386; the year's average CPI of 237.017 is the level
behind every 2015 figure on this page.
2015 was almost a year with no inflation at all. Consumer prices rose 0.1%,
the smallest increase since the 2009 decline, because energy prices kept
falling. Gasoline averaged $2.45 a gallon, down from $3.37 in 2014, and a
strong dollar made imported goods cheaper. The picture was different outside
food and energy: core prices rose about 1.8% as rents and medical costs
climbed.
Incomes finally showed real progress. Median household income reached $56,516,
a large jump from $53,657, and the median new home sold for about $296,400. The
federal minimum wage stayed at $7.25, and a first-class stamp stayed at 49
cents.
The Federal Reserve chose December to end its zero-rate policy, raising the
target range to 0.25–0.50% for the first time since 2006. It moved even
though headline inflation was far under 2%, arguing that the drag from
energy was temporary. Earlier, a currency shift in China in August had shaken
global markets and pushed oil below $40 a barrel. Prices in 2015 ended
the year barely above their 2014 level.
MLA: “Inflation from 1929 to 2015: $100 is worth $1,386 today.” InflationCalculator.com, U.S. Bureau of Labor Statistics CPI-U data, https://inflationcalculator.com/inflation/1929-to-2015/
APA: InflationCalculator.com. Inflation from 1929 to 2015. Based on U.S. Bureau of Labor Statistics CPI-U data. Retrieved from https://inflationcalculator.com/inflation/1929-to-2015/