$100 in 1934 is worth $883 in 1988,
because prices increased 782.8% over that period, an average of
4.12% a year.
$100 in 1934 has
the same buying power as
$883
in 1988
Detailed inflation statistics
Cumulative price change
782.8%
Average inflation rate
4.12% per year
Converted amount ($100 base)
$883
Price difference ($100 base)
$783
CPI in 1934
13.4
CPI in 1988
118.3
Inflation in 1934
3.08%
Inflation in 1988
4.14%
$100 in 1934 → 1988
$883
$100 in 1988 → 1934
$11.33
What happened to prices between 1934 and 1988
Between 1934 and 1988, the Consumer Price Index went from 13.4 to 118.3.
Cumulatively, prices increased 782.8%, which works out to an average of
4.12% per year. Put differently, a dollar in 1934 bought what
$0.11 buys in 1988: the 1934 dollar
lost 88.7% of its purchasing power over
these 54 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 1988 at the same ratio, 8.83: $1,000 becomes
$8,828, and $10,000 becomes $88,284.
Amount in 1934
Value in 1988
$1.00
$8.83
$5.00
$44.14
$10.00
$88.28
$20.00
$177
$50.00
$441
$100
$883
$500
$4,414
$1,000
$8,828
$5,000
$44,142
$10,000
$88,284
$100,000
$882,836
$1,000,000
$8,828,358
Inflation by spending category, 1934–1988
Between 1934 and 1988, food rose the most, up 919.0%, while apparel rose the least, up 460.2%, against 782.8% for all items. The headline number is an average; here is what $100 of 1934
spending costs in 1988, by category:
Category
Avg. yearly inflation
$100 in 1934 →
All items (CPI-U)
4.12%
$883
Food
4.39%
$1,019
Apparel
3.24%
$560
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 1988
Prices climbed fastest in the 1970s, averaging 7.82% a year, and slowest in the 1930s (0.73% a year). Each step below chains into the full 1934–1988 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
1960–1970
2.74%
31.1%
$290
1970–1980
7.82%
112.4%
$615
1980–1988
4.62%
43.6%
$883
Year by year: CPI and the value of $100 from 1934
$100 from 1934 had already become $221 by
1960, on its way to $883 in 1988; 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: 1988
In 1988, prices rose 4.1% and $100 from 1934 had the buying
power of $883; the year's average CPI of 118.3 is the level
behind every 1988 figure on this page.
By 1988, the economic expansion that began in the ashes of the 1981-82
recession was in its sixth year, and the Federal Reserve was watching for
signs it had run too long. Inflation rose to 4.1%, up from 3.6% the year
before, while unemployment fell to its lowest level since 1974. Alan
Greenspan’s Fed responded by raising the federal funds rate through the
year, from about 6.5% to 8.5%, trying to cool demand before prices
accelerated the way they had in the 1970s. Households still felt the
difference between this expansion and the last one: gas held near 90 cents
a gallon, almost exactly its 1987 price, and median household income rose
to roughly $27,200. The one price that moved was postage, which rose from
22 to 25 cents in April, the fourth increase of the decade but a far
gentler pace than the string of increases in the late 1970s and early
1980s. In November, Vice President George H.W. Bush won the presidency on
the strength of the expansion, promising in his nomination speech to hold
the line on taxes. Both the boom and that pledge would run into trouble
within two years, as the Fed’s rate increases helped tip the economy toward
the 1990-91 recession.
MLA: “Inflation from 1934 to 1988: $100 is worth $883 today.” InflationCalculator.com, U.S. Bureau of Labor Statistics CPI-U data, https://inflationcalculator.com/inflation/1934-to-1988/
APA: InflationCalculator.com. Inflation from 1934 to 1988. Based on U.S. Bureau of Labor Statistics CPI-U data. Retrieved from https://inflationcalculator.com/inflation/1934-to-1988/