$100 in 1933 is worth $954 in 1989,
because prices increased 853.8% over that period, an average of
4.11% a year.
$100 in 1933 has
the same buying power as
$954
in 1989
Detailed inflation statistics
Cumulative price change
853.8%
Average inflation rate
4.11% per year
Converted amount ($100 base)
$954
Price difference ($100 base)
$854
CPI in 1933
13
CPI in 1989
124
Inflation in 1933
-5.11%
Inflation in 1989
4.82%
$100 in 1933 → 1989
$954
$100 in 1989 → 1933
$10.48
What happened to prices between 1933 and 1989
Between 1933 and 1989, the Consumer Price Index went from 13 to 124.
Cumulatively, prices increased 853.8%, which works out to an average of
4.11% per year. Put differently, a dollar in 1933 bought what
$0.10 buys in 1989: the 1933 dollar
lost 89.5% of its purchasing power over
these 56 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 1989 at the same ratio, 9.54: $1,000 becomes
$9,538, and $10,000 becomes $95,385.
Amount in 1933
Value in 1989
$1.00
$9.54
$5.00
$47.69
$10.00
$95.38
$20.00
$191
$50.00
$477
$100
$954
$500
$4,769
$1,000
$9,538
$5,000
$47,692
$10,000
$95,385
$100,000
$953,846
$1,000,000
$9,538,462
Inflation by spending category, 1933–1989
Between 1933 and 1989, food rose the most, up 1102.9%, while apparel rose the least, up 530.9%, against 853.8% for all items. The headline number is an average; here is what $100 of 1933
spending costs in 1989, by category:
Category
Avg. yearly inflation
$100 in 1933 →
All items (CPI-U)
4.11%
$954
Food
4.54%
$1,203
Apparel
3.34%
$631
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 1989
Prices climbed fastest in the 1970s, averaging 7.82% a year, and slowest in the 1930s (1.06% a year). Each step below chains into the full 1933–1989 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
1960–1970
2.74%
31.1%
$298
1970–1980
7.82%
112.4%
$634
1980–1989
4.65%
50.5%
$954
Year by year: CPI and the value of $100 from 1933
$100 from 1933 had already become $230 by
1961, on its way to $954 in 1989; 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.
Long periods are sampled every 2 years; the calculator above covers any pair of years.
The destination year: 1989
In 1989, prices rose 4.8% and $100 from 1933 had the buying
power of $954; the year's average CPI of 124 is the level
behind every 1989 figure on this page.
1989 closed out a decade that began in economic crisis and ended in a long,
calmer expansion. Inflation for the year came in at 4.8%, higher than the
mid-decade lull but still roughly a third of the 13.5% peak that had opened
the decade in 1980. The federal minimum wage, unchanged at $3.35 an hour
since January 1981, had gone longer without an increase than at any point
since Congress created it, and had lost close to a third of its purchasing
power to inflation in the meantime; lawmakers would finally raise it to
$3.80 the following April. The decade’s other unfinished business came due
in August, when Congress passed FIRREA, the law that created the Resolution
Trust Corporation to seize and sell off the hundreds of savings and loan
institutions that a decade of deregulation and risky lending had left
insolvent, a bailout that eventually cost taxpayers over $100 billion. On
Wall Street, the recovery was already complete: the Dow Jones Industrial
Average closed 1989 at a record high, just over two years after Black
Monday’s 22.6% single-day crash, capping the bull market that had begun at
the Dow’s 776 low in August 1982. Between the S&L bailout, a wage floor
eroded by years without a raise, and a stock market at new highs, 1989
captured how unevenly the decade’s disinflation had been felt.
MLA: “Inflation from 1933 to 1989: $100 is worth $954 today.” InflationCalculator.com, U.S. Bureau of Labor Statistics CPI-U data, https://inflationcalculator.com/inflation/1933-to-1989/
APA: InflationCalculator.com. Inflation from 1933 to 1989. Based on U.S. Bureau of Labor Statistics CPI-U data. Retrieved from https://inflationcalculator.com/inflation/1933-to-1989/