$100 in 1934 is worth $235 in 1965,
because prices increased 135.1% over that period, an average of
2.80% a year.
$100 in 1934 has
the same buying power as
$235
in 1965
Detailed inflation statistics
Cumulative price change
135.1%
Average inflation rate
2.80% per year
Converted amount ($100 base)
$235
Price difference ($100 base)
$135
CPI in 1934
13.4
CPI in 1965
31.5
Inflation in 1934
3.08%
Inflation in 1965
1.61%
$100 in 1934 → 1965
$235
$100 in 1965 → 1934
$42.54
What happened to prices between 1934 and 1965
Between 1934 and 1965, the Consumer Price Index went from 13.4 to 31.5.
Cumulatively, prices increased 135.1%, which works out to an average of
2.80% per year. Put differently, a dollar in 1934 bought what
$0.43 buys in 1965: the 1934 dollar
lost 57.5% of its purchasing power over
these 31 years.
Consumer prices rose 3.1% in 1934, the first annual increase since 1926;
every year from 1927 through 1933 had been flat or falling,
so the turn marked a real break after eight years without a single gain.
Currency policy did some of the work. The Gold Reserve Act, signed January
30, formally devalued the dollar by raising the official price of gold from
$20.67 to $35 an ounce, part of the administration’s deliberate effort to
reflate prices after four straight years of deflation. Financial regulation
tightened at the same time: the Securities Exchange Act of June 6 created
the Securities and Exchange Commission to police stock exchanges and enforce
disclosure rules, a direct response to the speculation blamed for the 1929
crash. The recovery was fragile and unevenly felt, especially on the Great
Plains, where drought had turned overplowed farmland to dust. Over May 9-11,
high winds lifted an estimated 350 million tons of topsoil into the air,
darkening skies as far away as Washington and New York and giving city
readers who had never seen a wheat field a first glimpse of the disaster
building in Kansas, Oklahoma, and Texas. Consumer prices stood 35.4% above
their 1913 level, still well below the 1929 peak but rising
for the first time since the Depression began. First-class postage held at
3 cents.
Every 1934 amount converts to 1965 at the same ratio, 2.35: $1,000 becomes
$2,351, and $10,000 becomes $23,507.
Amount in 1934
Value in 1965
$1.00
$2.35
$5.00
$11.75
$10.00
$23.51
$20.00
$47.01
$50.00
$118
$100
$235
$500
$1,175
$1,000
$2,351
$5,000
$11,754
$10,000
$23,507
$100,000
$235,075
$1,000,000
$2,350,746
Inflation by spending category, 1934–1965
Between 1934 and 1965, food rose the most, up 177.6%, while apparel rose the least, up 132.0%, against 135.1% for all items. The headline number is an average; here is what $100 of 1934
spending costs in 1965, by category:
Category
Avg. yearly inflation
$100 in 1934 →
All items (CPI-U)
2.80%
$235
Food
3.35%
$278
Apparel
2.75%
$232
Not shown because the BLS began these indexes after 1934: core (all items less food & energy) (1957–), energy (1957–), housing (1967–), medical care (1935–), transportation (1935–), recreation (1993–), education & communication (1993–).
Decade by decade: 1934 to 1965
Prices climbed fastest in the 1940s, averaging 5.58% a year, and slowest in the 1930s (0.73% a year). Each step below chains into the full 1934–1965 change:
Years
Avg. yearly inflation
Price change
$100 from 1934, at end
1934–1940
0.73%
4.5%
$104
1940–1950
5.58%
72.1%
$180
1950–1960
2.08%
22.8%
$221
1960–1965
1.25%
6.4%
$235
Year by year: CPI and the value of $100 from 1934
$100 from 1934 had already become $180 by
1950, on its way to $235 in 1965; 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: 1965
In 1965, prices rose 1.6% and $100 from 1934 had the buying
power of $235; the year's average CPI of 31.5 is the level
behind every 1965 figure on this page.
Consumer prices rose 1.6% in 1965, up from 1964’s 1.3% in a
pickup that economists later mark as the start of the Great
Inflation, a run of accelerating
price increases driven by rising Vietnam War spending layered on top of
new Great Society programs. The war itself escalated on the ground that
March, when about 3,500 Marines came ashore at Da Nang, the first American
combat troops committed to Vietnam; troop levels would climb toward
200,000 by year’s end. Domestic policy expanded just as fast: Medicare and
Medicaid became law that July 30, creating federal health insurance for
older and low-income Americans, and the Voting Rights Act, signed that
August 6, banned literacy tests and other devices used to disenfranchise
Black voters. The civil rights movement’s gains coexisted with urban
unrest that same August, when a highway patrol traffic stop in the Watts
neighborhood of Los Angeles set off six days of rioting that left 34
people dead. Consumer prices finished 1965 218.2% above their
1913 level. First-class postage held at 5 cents, and the
minimum wage stayed at $1.25 an hour.
MLA: “Inflation from 1934 to 1965: $100 is worth $235 today.” InflationCalculator.com, U.S. Bureau of Labor Statistics CPI-U data, https://inflationcalculator.com/inflation/1934-to-1965/
APA: InflationCalculator.com. Inflation from 1934 to 1965. Based on U.S. Bureau of Labor Statistics CPI-U data. Retrieved from https://inflationcalculator.com/inflation/1934-to-1965/