$100 in 1930 is worth $1,531 in 2019,
because prices increased 1430.9% over that period, an average of
3.11% a year.
$100 in 1930 has
the same buying power as
$1,531
in 2019
Detailed inflation statistics
Cumulative price change
1430.9%
Average inflation rate
3.11% per year
Converted amount ($100 base)
$1,531
Price difference ($100 base)
$1,431
CPI in 1930
16.7
CPI in 2019
255.657
Inflation in 1930
-2.34%
Inflation in 2019
1.81%
$100 in 1930 → 2019
$1,531
$100 in 2019 → 1930
$6.53
What happened to prices between 1930 and 2019
Between 1930 and 2019, the Consumer Price Index went from 16.7 to 255.657.
Cumulatively, prices increased 1430.9%, which works out to an average of
3.11% per year. Put differently, a dollar in 1930 bought what
$0.07 buys in 2019: the 1930 dollar
lost 93.5% of its purchasing power over
these 89 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 2019 at the same ratio, 15.31: $1,000 becomes
$15,309, and $10,000 becomes $153,088.
Amount in 1930
Value in 2019
$1.00
$15.31
$5.00
$76.54
$10.00
$153
$20.00
$306
$50.00
$765
$100
$1,531
$500
$7,654
$1,000
$15,309
$5,000
$76,544
$10,000
$153,088
$100,000
$1,530,880
$1,000,000
$15,308,802
Inflation by spending category, 1930–2019
Between 1930 and 2019, food rose the most, up 1555.9%, while apparel rose the least, up 412.6%, against 1430.9% for all items. The headline number is an average; here is what $100 of 1930
spending costs in 2019, by category:
Category
Avg. yearly inflation
$100 in 1930 →
All items (CPI-U)
3.11%
$1,531
Food
3.20%
$1,656
Apparel
1.85%
$513
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 2019
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 1930–2019 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
2010–2019
1.78%
17.2%
$1,531
Year by year: CPI and the value of $100 from 1930
$100 from 1930 had already become $322 by
1975, on its way to $1,531 in 2019; 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: 2019
In 2019, prices rose 1.8% and $100 from 1930 had the buying
power of $1,531; the year's average CPI of 255.657 is the level
behind every 2019 figure on this page.
2019 was the last ordinary year before COVID-19. Consumer prices rose 1.8%,
slightly under the Federal Reserve’s 2% target, with gasoline averaging
$2.60 a gallon. Median household income jumped to $68,703, the highest on
record up to that point, and the median new home sold for about $328,000. A
first-class stamp rose to 55 cents.
The Fed reversed course. After four increases in 2018, it cut rates three
times, to 1.50–1.75%, citing slower global growth, trade tensions, and low
inflation. In July the expansion that began in June 2009 became the longest in
U.S. records, and in August the yield curve briefly inverted, a signal
investors read as a recession warning.
For workers at the bottom of the pay scale, 2019 marked a milestone of a
different kind. The federal minimum wage stayed at $7.25 and reached its tenth
year without an increase, the longest gap since the wage was first set. Because
prices had climbed about 19% since it was last raised in 2009, its buying power
was lower than at any point in that span.
MLA: “Inflation from 1930 to 2019: $100 is worth $1,531 today.” InflationCalculator.com, U.S. Bureau of Labor Statistics CPI-U data, https://inflationcalculator.com/inflation/1930-to-2019/
APA: InflationCalculator.com. Inflation from 1930 to 2019. Based on U.S. Bureau of Labor Statistics CPI-U data. Retrieved from https://inflationcalculator.com/inflation/1930-to-2019/