$100 in 1930 is worth $1,504 in 2018,
because prices increased 1403.6% over that period, an average of
3.13% a year.
$100 in 1930 has
the same buying power as
$1,504
in 2018
Detailed inflation statistics
Cumulative price change
1403.6%
Average inflation rate
3.13% per year
Converted amount ($100 base)
$1,504
Price difference ($100 base)
$1,404
CPI in 1930
16.7
CPI in 2018
251.107
Inflation in 1930
-2.34%
Inflation in 2018
2.44%
$100 in 1930 → 2018
$1,504
$100 in 2018 → 1930
$6.65
What happened to prices between 1930 and 2018
Between 1930 and 2018, the Consumer Price Index went from 16.7 to 251.107.
Cumulatively, prices increased 1403.6%, which works out to an average of
3.13% per year. Put differently, a dollar in 1930 bought what
$0.07 buys in 2018: the 1930 dollar
lost 93.3% of its purchasing power over
these 88 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 2018 at the same ratio, 15.04: $1,000 becomes
$15,036, and $10,000 becomes $150,363.
Amount in 1930
Value in 2018
$1.00
$15.04
$5.00
$75.18
$10.00
$150
$20.00
$301
$50.00
$752
$100
$1,504
$500
$7,518
$1,000
$15,036
$5,000
$75,182
$10,000
$150,363
$100,000
$1,503,635
$1,000,000
$15,036,347
Inflation by spending category, 1930–2018
Between 1930 and 2018, food rose the most, up 1525.4%, while apparel rose the least, up 419.2%, against 1403.6% for all items. The headline number is an average; here is what $100 of 1930
spending costs in 2018, by category:
Category
Avg. yearly inflation
$100 in 1930 →
All items (CPI-U)
3.13%
$1,504
Food
3.22%
$1,625
Apparel
1.89%
$519
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 2018
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 1930–2018 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
2000–2010
2.39%
26.6%
$1,306
2010–2018
1.78%
15.2%
$1,504
Year by year: CPI and the value of $100 from 1930
$100 from 1930 had already become $322 by
1975, on its way to $1,504 in 2018; 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: 2018
In 2018, prices rose 2.4% and $100 from 1930 had the buying
power of $1,504; the year's average CPI of 251.107 is the level
behind every 2018 figure on this page.
2018 was the peak of the late-2010s expansion. Consumer prices rose 2.4%,
the fastest since 2011, with gasoline averaging $2.72 a gallon after a summer
high. Unemployment fell to 3.7% in September, the lowest since 1969, and median
household income reached $63,179. The median new home sold for about $331,800,
and a first-class stamp cost 50 cents. The federal minimum wage was still $7.25.
Trade policy became a price factor for the first time in decades. New tariffs
on steel, aluminum, and a growing list of Chinese goods raised costs for
manufacturers and some consumer products, and retaliation cut into exports of
soybeans and other farm goods.
The Federal Reserve, led from February by Jerome Powell, raised rates four
times to 2.25–2.50%. A stock-market drop of nearly 20% in the fourth quarter
led the Fed to signal a pause in early 2019. Oil fell from over $75 a barrel in
October to below $50 by December, which pulled headline inflation lower going
into the next year.
MLA: “Inflation from 1930 to 2018: $100 is worth $1,504 today.” InflationCalculator.com, U.S. Bureau of Labor Statistics CPI-U data, https://inflationcalculator.com/inflation/1930-to-2018/
APA: InflationCalculator.com. Inflation from 1930 to 2018. Based on U.S. Bureau of Labor Statistics CPI-U data. Retrieved from https://inflationcalculator.com/inflation/1930-to-2018/