$100 in 1930 is worth $1,060 in 2001,
because prices increased 960.5% over that period, an average of
3.38% a year.
$100 in 1930 has
the same buying power as
$1,060
in 2001
Detailed inflation statistics
Cumulative price change
960.5%
Average inflation rate
3.38% per year
Converted amount ($100 base)
$1,060
Price difference ($100 base)
$960
CPI in 1930
16.7
CPI in 2001
177.1
Inflation in 1930
-2.34%
Inflation in 2001
2.85%
$100 in 1930 → 2001
$1,060
$100 in 2001 → 1930
$9.43
What happened to prices between 1930 and 2001
Between 1930 and 2001, the Consumer Price Index went from 16.7 to 177.1.
Cumulatively, prices increased 960.5%, which works out to an average of
3.38% per year. Put differently, a dollar in 1930 bought what
$0.09 buys in 2001: the 1930 dollar
lost 90.6% of its purchasing power over
these 71 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 2001 at the same ratio, 10.60: $1,000 becomes
$10,605, and $10,000 becomes $106,048.
Amount in 1930
Value in 2001
$1.00
$10.60
$5.00
$53.02
$10.00
$106
$20.00
$212
$50.00
$530
$100
$1,060
$500
$5,302
$1,000
$10,605
$5,000
$53,024
$10,000
$106,048
$100,000
$1,060,479
$1,000,000
$10,604,790
Inflation by spending category, 1930–2001
Between 1930 and 2001, food rose the most, up 1009.6%, while apparel rose the least, up 426.0%, against 960.5% for all items. The headline number is an average; here is what $100 of 1930
spending costs in 2001, by category:
Category
Avg. yearly inflation
$100 in 1930 →
All items (CPI-U)
3.38%
$1,060
Food
3.45%
$1,110
Apparel
2.37%
$526
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 2001
Prices climbed fastest in the 1970s, averaging 7.82% a year, and fell in the 1930s (1.7% a year). Each step below chains into the full 1930–2001 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
1970–1980
7.82%
112.4%
$493
1980–1990
4.72%
58.6%
$783
1990–2000
2.80%
31.8%
$1,031
2000–2001
2.85%
2.8%
$1,060
Year by year: CPI and the value of $100 from 1930
$100 from 1930 had already become $189 by
1965, on its way to $1,060 in 2001; 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: 2001
In 2001, prices rose 2.8% and $100 from 1930 had the buying
power of $1,060; the year's average CPI of 177.1 is the level
behind every 2001 figure on this page.
Inflation fell to 2.8% in 2001 from 3.4% the year before, as a recession that began in March
cut demand and gasoline slid to an average of $1.46 a gallon. The median household earned about
$42,200, roughly flat from 2000, and a new home cost about $175,200. The Federal Reserve cut its
policy rate 11 times over the year, from 6.5% to 1.75%, the lowest since 1961. After the
September 11 attacks, U.S. stock markets closed for four trading days, and air travel dropped
sharply until the following year. Congress had already passed a $1.35 trillion tax cut in June,
which included rebate checks of up to $600. The National Bureau of Economic Research dates the
recession’s end at November, but unemployment kept rising into 2003. A first-class stamp went to
34 cents in January, and the federal minimum wage stayed at $5.15. The Fed’s cuts were the
first step in a long period of very cheap borrowing that would fuel the housing boom.
MLA: “Inflation from 1930 to 2001: $100 is worth $1,060 today.” InflationCalculator.com, U.S. Bureau of Labor Statistics CPI-U data, https://inflationcalculator.com/inflation/1930-to-2001/
APA: InflationCalculator.com. Inflation from 1930 to 2001. Based on U.S. Bureau of Labor Statistics CPI-U data. Retrieved from https://inflationcalculator.com/inflation/1930-to-2001/