$100 in 1930 is worth $243 in 1971,
because prices increased 142.5% over that period, an average of
2.18% a year.
$100 in 1930 has
the same buying power as
$243
in 1971
Detailed inflation statistics
Cumulative price change
142.5%
Average inflation rate
2.18% per year
Converted amount ($100 base)
$243
Price difference ($100 base)
$143
CPI in 1930
16.7
CPI in 1971
40.5
Inflation in 1930
-2.34%
Inflation in 1971
4.38%
$100 in 1930 → 1971
$243
$100 in 1971 → 1930
$41.23
What happened to prices between 1930 and 1971
Between 1930 and 1971, the Consumer Price Index went from 16.7 to 40.5.
Cumulatively, prices increased 142.5%, which works out to an average of
2.18% per year. Put differently, a dollar in 1930 bought what
$0.41 buys in 1971: the 1930 dollar
lost 58.8% of its purchasing power over
these 41 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 1971 at the same ratio, 2.43: $1,000 becomes
$2,425, and $10,000 becomes $24,251.
Amount in 1930
Value in 1971
$1.00
$2.43
$5.00
$12.13
$10.00
$24.25
$20.00
$48.50
$50.00
$121
$100
$243
$500
$1,213
$1,000
$2,425
$5,000
$12,126
$10,000
$24,251
$100,000
$242,515
$1,000,000
$2,425,150
Inflation by spending category, 1930–1971
Between 1930 and 1971, food rose the most, up 159.0%, while apparel rose the least, up 152.5%, against 142.5% for all items. The headline number is an average; here is what $100 of 1930
spending costs in 1971, by category:
Category
Avg. yearly inflation
$100 in 1930 →
All items (CPI-U)
2.18%
$243
Food
2.35%
$259
Apparel
2.28%
$252
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 1971
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 1930–1971 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
1960–1970
2.74%
31.1%
$232
1970–1971
4.38%
4.4%
$243
Year by year: CPI and the value of $100 from 1930
$100 from 1930 had already become $144 by
1950, on its way to $243 in 1971; 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: 1971
In 1971, prices rose 4.4% and $100 from 1930 had the buying
power of $243; the year's average CPI of 40.5 is the level
behind every 1971 figure on this page.
Consumer prices rose 4.4% in 1971, down from 1970’s 5.7% as
the recession that started in December 1969 finally cooled demand. The bigger
economic story came that August 15, when President Nixon closed the “gold
window” that let foreign governments exchange dollars for gold, ending the
Bretton Woods system that had anchored the dollar since World War II. The
same address announced a 90-day freeze on wages and prices, the first
peacetime controls the country had seen, an attempt to break inflationary
expectations without the slower grind of tighter money. The “Nixon Shock,” as
it came to be known, let the dollar float against other currencies for the
first time and set the stage for a wage-and-price-control regime that would
run in various forms into 1973. Politically, the country lowered its voting
age that year: the 26th Amendment, ratified July 1, extended the vote to
18-year-olds, capping a campaign built on the argument that men old enough to
be drafted to Vietnam were old enough to vote for the people who sent them.
The Postal Service, independent since 1970’s reorganization, raised
first-class postage from 6 to 8 cents that May. A median household earned
$9,028 in 1971, up from $8,734 the year before, while gas held near 36 cents
a gallon and a new home sold for a median $25,200. Consumer prices stood
309.1% above their 1913 level by year’s end, still years away
from the double-digit inflation the controls were meant to prevent.
MLA: “Inflation from 1930 to 1971: $100 is worth $243 today.” InflationCalculator.com, U.S. Bureau of Labor Statistics CPI-U data, https://inflationcalculator.com/inflation/1930-to-1971/
APA: InflationCalculator.com. Inflation from 1930 to 1971. Based on U.S. Bureau of Labor Statistics CPI-U data. Retrieved from https://inflationcalculator.com/inflation/1930-to-1971/