$100 in 1930 is worth $435 in 1979,
because prices increased 334.7% over that period, an average of
3.04% a year.
$100 in 1930 has
the same buying power as
$435
in 1979
Detailed inflation statistics
Cumulative price change
334.7%
Average inflation rate
3.04% per year
Converted amount ($100 base)
$435
Price difference ($100 base)
$335
CPI in 1930
16.7
CPI in 1979
72.6
Inflation in 1930
-2.34%
Inflation in 1979
11.35%
$100 in 1930 → 1979
$435
$100 in 1979 → 1930
$23.00
What happened to prices between 1930 and 1979
Between 1930 and 1979, the Consumer Price Index went from 16.7 to 72.6.
Cumulatively, prices increased 334.7%, which works out to an average of
3.04% per year. Put differently, a dollar in 1930 bought what
$0.23 buys in 1979: the 1930 dollar
lost 77.0% of its purchasing power over
these 49 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 1979 at the same ratio, 4.35: $1,000 becomes
$4,347, and $10,000 becomes $43,473.
Amount in 1930
Value in 1979
$1.00
$4.35
$5.00
$21.74
$10.00
$43.47
$20.00
$86.95
$50.00
$217
$100
$435
$500
$2,174
$1,000
$4,347
$5,000
$21,737
$10,000
$43,473
$100,000
$434,731
$1,000,000
$4,347,305
Inflation by spending category, 1930–1979
Between 1930 and 1979, food rose the most, up 412.2%, while apparel rose the least, up 250.8%, against 334.7% for all items. The headline number is an average; here is what $100 of 1930
spending costs in 1979, by category:
Category
Avg. yearly inflation
$100 in 1930 →
All items (CPI-U)
3.04%
$435
Food
3.39%
$512
Apparel
2.59%
$351
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 1979
Prices climbed fastest in the 1970s, averaging 7.21% a year, and fell in the 1930s (1.7% a year). Each step below chains into the full 1930–1979 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
1970–1979
7.21%
87.1%
$435
Year by year: CPI and the value of $100 from 1930
$100 from 1930 had already become $161 by
1954, on its way to $435 in 1979; 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: 1979
In 1979, prices rose 11.3% and $100 from 1930 had the buying
power of $435; the year's average CPI of 72.6 is the level
behind every 1979 figure on this page.
Consumer prices rose 11.3% in 1979, the fastest pace since 1947 and the
decade’s second bout of double-digit inflation after 1974’s
11.0%. The trigger was familiar: the Iranian Revolution that January halted
Iran’s oil exports, and panic buying amplified the shortage, sending crude
prices sharply higher over the year and motorists back into gas lines, with
some states reviving the odd-even rationing last seen in 1974. Paul Volcker,
appointed Federal Reserve chairman that August, responded with a strategy
shift announced that October: the Fed would target the money supply directly
and let interest rates rise as high as necessary to break inflation, whatever
the short-term cost. That cost would arrive as a deep recession in 1981-82,
but by year’s end 1979 had already delivered enough turmoil on its own. A
reactor at the Three Mile Island plant near Harrisburg, Pennsylvania,
suffered a partial core meltdown that March 28, the worst commercial nuclear
accident in U.S. history, and on November 4, militants in Tehran stormed the
U.S. embassy and took 52 Americans hostage, beginning a 444-day crisis that
consumed the rest of Carter’s presidency. A median household earned $16,461
in 1979, a new home sold for a median $62,900, and gas jumped to 86 cents a
gallon. Consumer prices finished the decade 97.8% above where they stood in
1969, very nearly doubling in ten years, and stood 633.3%
above their 1913 level. The 1970s had opened with inflation
cooling from the 1969 spike and closed with prices rising faster than at any
point since 1947, setting up the Great
Inflation’s final act in 1980.
MLA: “Inflation from 1930 to 1979: $100 is worth $435 today.” InflationCalculator.com, U.S. Bureau of Labor Statistics CPI-U data, https://inflationcalculator.com/inflation/1930-to-1979/
APA: InflationCalculator.com. Inflation from 1930 to 1979. Based on U.S. Bureau of Labor Statistics CPI-U data. Retrieved from https://inflationcalculator.com/inflation/1930-to-1979/