$100 in 1933 is worth $228 in 1960,
because prices increased 127.7% over that period, an average of
3.09% a year.
$100 in 1933 has
the same buying power as
$228
in 1960
Detailed inflation statistics
Cumulative price change
127.7%
Average inflation rate
3.09% per year
Converted amount ($100 base)
$228
Price difference ($100 base)
$128
CPI in 1933
13
CPI in 1960
29.6
Inflation in 1933
-5.11%
Inflation in 1960
1.72%
$100 in 1933 → 1960
$228
$100 in 1960 → 1933
$43.92
What happened to prices between 1933 and 1960
Between 1933 and 1960, the Consumer Price Index went from 13 to 29.6.
Cumulatively, prices increased 127.7%, which works out to an average of
3.09% per year. Put differently, a dollar in 1933 bought what
$0.44 buys in 1960: the 1933 dollar
lost 56.1% of its purchasing power over
these 27 years.
Consumer prices fell 5.1% in 1933, a smaller decline than 1932’s
but enough to complete a four-year slide of 24.0% from the 1929
peak. The National Bureau of Economic Research dates the trough of that
contraction to March 1933, closing out the longest downturn in its
chronology, one that had run 43 months since August 1929. The bottom
arrived alongside a change in government: Franklin D. Roosevelt was
inaugurated March 4 and, within 48 hours, ordered every bank in the country
closed to halt a fresh round of runs. Congress passed the Emergency Banking
Act on March 9, letting solvent banks reopen under federal supervision, and
the panic that had been building for months broke almost immediately. The
administration moved on the currency next: Executive Order 6102, issued
April 5, required Americans to turn in most gold coin, bullion, and
certificates to the Federal Reserve, taking the country off the domestic
gold standard (formal devaluation of the dollar followed the next January).
Congress capped the year’s banking overhaul in June with the Banking Act of
1933, commonly called Glass-Steagall, which created the Federal Deposit
Insurance Corporation and separated commercial banking from investment
banking. Even after four straight years of falling prices, the CPI still
stood 31.3% above its 1913 level. First-class postage held at
3 cents.
Every 1933 amount converts to 1960 at the same ratio, 2.28: $1,000 becomes
$2,277, and $10,000 becomes $22,769.
Amount in 1933
Value in 1960
$1.00
$2.28
$5.00
$11.38
$10.00
$22.77
$20.00
$45.54
$50.00
$114
$100
$228
$500
$1,138
$1,000
$2,277
$5,000
$11,385
$10,000
$22,769
$100,000
$227,692
$1,000,000
$2,276,923
Inflation by spending category, 1933–1960
Between 1933 and 1960, food rose the most, up 188.5%, while apparel rose the least, up 143.1%, against 127.7% for all items. The headline number is an average; here is what $100 of 1933
spending costs in 1960, by category:
Category
Avg. yearly inflation
$100 in 1933 →
All items (CPI-U)
3.09%
$228
Food
4.00%
$288
Apparel
3.34%
$243
Not shown because the BLS began these indexes after 1933: core (all items less food & energy) (1957–), energy (1957–), housing (1967–), medical care (1935–), transportation (1935–), recreation (1993–), education & communication (1993–).
Decade by decade: 1933 to 1960
Prices climbed fastest in the 1940s, averaging 5.58% a year, and slowest in the 1930s (1.06% a year). Each step below chains into the full 1933–1960 change:
Years
Avg. yearly inflation
Price change
$100 from 1933, at end
1933–1940
1.06%
7.7%
$108
1940–1950
5.58%
72.1%
$185
1950–1960
2.08%
22.8%
$228
Year by year: CPI and the value of $100 from 1933
$100 from 1933 had already become $150 by
1946, on its way to $228 in 1960; 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 2.1% in 1938, the deepest deflation of the period.
In 1960, prices rose 1.7% and $100 from 1933 had the buying
power of $228; the year's average CPI of 29.6 is the level
behind every 1960 figure on this page.
Consumer prices rose 1.7% in 1960, up from 1959’s 0.7% even
as the economy slipped into recession that April, a downturn that would
prove the shortest since World War II. The year’s defining political
moment came that November, when John F. Kennedy narrowly defeated Richard
Nixon in one of the closest presidential elections in U.S. history,
decided by roughly two-tenths of a percentage point in the popular vote.
Television played a new role in the race: the first-ever televised
presidential debate that September, watched by an estimated 70 million
people, was widely seen as favoring the telegenic Kennedy. Civil rights
protest took a new form that February, when four Black freshmen at North
Carolina A&T State University sat down at a whites-only Woolworth’s lunch
counter in Greensboro and refused to leave; the sit-in tactic spread to
dozens of Southern cities within weeks. Cold War tensions flared that May,
when a Soviet missile downed an American U-2 spy plane deep inside Soviet
airspace. The pilot, Francis Gary Powers, was captured alive, embarrassing
the Eisenhower administration and collapsing a Paris summit called to ease
relations with Moscow. Consumer prices finished 1960 199.0% above their
1913 level. First-class postage held at 4 cents, and the
minimum wage stayed at $1.00 an hour.
MLA: “Inflation from 1933 to 1960: $100 is worth $228 today.” InflationCalculator.com, U.S. Bureau of Labor Statistics CPI-U data, https://inflationcalculator.com/inflation/1933-to-1960/
APA: InflationCalculator.com. Inflation from 1933 to 1960. Based on U.S. Bureau of Labor Statistics CPI-U data. Retrieved from https://inflationcalculator.com/inflation/1933-to-1960/