$100 in 1930 is worth $208 in 1968,
because prices increased 108.4% over that period, an average of
1.95% a year.
$100 in 1930 has
the same buying power as
$208
in 1968
Detailed inflation statistics
Cumulative price change
108.4%
Average inflation rate
1.95% per year
Converted amount ($100 base)
$208
Price difference ($100 base)
$108
CPI in 1930
16.7
CPI in 1968
34.8
Inflation in 1930
-2.34%
Inflation in 1968
4.19%
$100 in 1930 → 1968
$208
$100 in 1968 → 1930
$47.99
What happened to prices between 1930 and 1968
Between 1930 and 1968, the Consumer Price Index went from 16.7 to 34.8.
Cumulatively, prices increased 108.4%, which works out to an average of
1.95% per year. Put differently, a dollar in 1930 bought what
$0.48 buys in 1968: the 1930 dollar
lost 52.0% of its purchasing power over
these 38 years.
Consumer prices fell 2.3% in 1930, a mild decline compared with what was
coming but the first sign that the summer 1929 downturn was not going to be
short. The National Bureau of Economic Research dates that contraction from
August 1929, and by the time it finally bottomed out in March 1933 it would
run 43 months, the longest of any downturn in the NBER’s chronology back to
1854. Congress made the trade picture worse in June, when President Hoover
signed the Smoot-Hawley Tariff Act, raising duties on more than 20,000
imported goods to some of the highest levels in a century. Trading partners
retaliated with tariffs of their own, and global trade volumes collapsed
over the next several years, deepening a downturn economists still debate
how much the tariff itself worsened. The financial system cracked that fall:
a regional banking panic culminated in the December 11 failure of the Bank
of United States in New York, at the time the largest bank failure in
American history, wiping out more than $200 million in deposits. It was the
first of four banking panics that would hit the country before 1933 was
out. Consumer prices still stood 68.7% above their 1913
starting point, but the direction had clearly turned. First-class postage
held at 2 cents, unchanged for eleven straight years.
Every 1930 amount converts to 1968 at the same ratio, 2.08: $1,000 becomes
$2,084, and $10,000 becomes $20,838.
Amount in 1930
Value in 1968
$1.00
$2.08
$5.00
$10.42
$10.00
$20.84
$20.00
$41.68
$50.00
$104
$100
$208
$500
$1,042
$1,000
$2,084
$5,000
$10,419
$10,000
$20,838
$100,000
$208,383
$1,000,000
$2,083,832
Inflation by spending category, 1930–1968
Between 1930 and 1968, food rose the most, up 126.3%, while apparel rose the least, up 121.9%, against 108.4% for all items. The headline number is an average; here is what $100 of 1930
spending costs in 1968, by category:
Category
Avg. yearly inflation
$100 in 1930 →
All items (CPI-U)
1.95%
$208
Food
2.17%
$226
Apparel
2.12%
$222
Not shown because the BLS began these indexes after 1930: core (all items less food & energy) (1957–), energy (1957–), housing (1967–), medical care (1935–), transportation (1935–), recreation (1993–), education & communication (1993–).
Decade by decade: 1930 to 1968
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 1930–1968 change:
Years
Avg. yearly inflation
Price change
$100 from 1930, at end
1930–1940
-1.75%
-16.2%
$83.83
1940–1950
5.58%
72.1%
$144
1950–1960
2.08%
22.8%
$177
1960–1968
2.04%
17.6%
$208
Year by year: CPI and the value of $100 from 1930
$100 from 1930 had already become $144 by
1948, on its way to $208 in 1968; 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: 1968
In 1968, prices rose 4.2% and $100 from 1930 had the buying
power of $208; the year's average CPI of 34.8 is the level
behind every 1968 figure on this page.
Consumer prices rose 4.2% in 1968, up sharply from 1967’s
3.1% and the fastest pace in 17 years, as Vietnam War spending and a tight
labor market pushed inflation higher despite the Federal Reserve’s
earlier tightening. The year was marked by political violence: Martin
Luther King Jr. was assassinated on a motel balcony in Memphis on April
4, touching off rioting in more than 100 cities, and Robert F. Kennedy was
shot in Los Angeles on June 5, moments after winning California’s
Democratic presidential primary, and died the next day. Washington tried
to answer the inflation problem directly that June 28, when Congress
passed a 10% income tax surcharge, the Revenue and Expenditure Control
Act, temporarily raising taxes and cutting spending to cool an economy
overheated by war and Great Society outlays; prices kept accelerating
anyway. The cost of living rose in smaller, more visible ways too:
first-class postage climbed to 6 cents that January 7, and the minimum
wage rose to $1.60 an hour that February 1, the final step of the
increase Congress had set two years earlier. Consumer prices finished
1968 251.5% above their 1913 level.
MLA: “Inflation from 1930 to 1968: $100 is worth $208 today.” InflationCalculator.com, U.S. Bureau of Labor Statistics CPI-U data, https://inflationcalculator.com/inflation/1930-to-1968/
APA: InflationCalculator.com. Inflation from 1930 to 1968. Based on U.S. Bureau of Labor Statistics CPI-U data. Retrieved from https://inflationcalculator.com/inflation/1930-to-1968/