$100 in 1935 is worth $704 in 1982,
because prices increased 604.4% over that period, an average of
4.24% a year.
$100 in 1935 has
the same buying power as
$704
in 1982
Detailed inflation statistics
Cumulative price change
604.4%
Average inflation rate
4.24% per year
Converted amount ($100 base)
$704
Price difference ($100 base)
$604
CPI in 1935
13.7
CPI in 1982
96.5
Inflation in 1935
2.24%
Inflation in 1982
6.16%
$100 in 1935 → 1982
$704
$100 in 1982 → 1935
$14.20
What happened to prices between 1935 and 1982
Between 1935 and 1982, the Consumer Price Index went from 13.7 to 96.5.
Cumulatively, prices increased 604.4%, which works out to an average of
4.24% per year. Put differently, a dollar in 1935 bought what
$0.14 buys in 1982: the 1935 dollar
lost 85.8% of its purchasing power over
these 47 years.
Consumer prices rose 2.2% in 1935, a second straight annual increase after
1934’s turnaround, though the CPI still sat well below its
1929 peak and the recovery remained uneven and incomplete.
The year’s biggest legislative achievements aimed at making that unevenness
less punishing. Roosevelt signed the Social Security Act on August 14,
creating federal old-age pensions and unemployment insurance funded by a new
payroll tax, the first federal safety net of its kind in U.S. history. That
spring, the Works Progress Administration had already begun putting millions
of unemployed Americans to work on public construction, arts, and
infrastructure projects, becoming the largest jobs program of the New Deal.
Congress added labor protections to the mix that July with the National
Labor Relations Act, guaranteeing most private-sector workers the right to
organize and bargain collectively. The human cost of the Dust Bowl was still
mounting on the Plains: the storm known as Black Sunday hit on April 14,
one of the worst of the decade, and continued drought kept driving farm
families off land that could no longer support them. Consumer prices ended
the year 38.4% above their 1913 level. First-class postage
held at 3 cents.
Every 1935 amount converts to 1982 at the same ratio, 7.04: $1,000 becomes
$7,044, and $10,000 becomes $70,438.
Amount in 1935
Value in 1982
$1.00
$7.04
$5.00
$35.22
$10.00
$70.44
$20.00
$141
$50.00
$352
$100
$704
$500
$3,522
$1,000
$7,044
$5,000
$35,219
$10,000
$70,438
$100,000
$704,380
$1,000,000
$7,043,796
Inflation by spending category, 1935–1982
Between 1935 and 1982, medical care rose the most, up 806.9%, while apparel rose the least, up 370.2%, against 604.4% for all items. The headline number is an average; here is what $100 of 1935
spending costs in 1982, by category:
Category
Avg. yearly inflation
$100 in 1935 →
All items (CPI-U)
4.24%
$704
Medical care
4.80%
$907
Food
4.48%
$785
Transportation
4.17%
$683
Apparel
3.35%
$470
Not shown because the BLS began these indexes after 1935: core (all items less food & energy) (1957–), energy (1957–), housing (1967–), recreation (1993–), education & communication (1993–).
Decade by decade: 1935 to 1982
Prices climbed fastest in the 1980s, averaging 8.22% a year, and slowest in the 1930s (0.43% a year). Each step below chains into the full 1935–1982 change:
Years
Avg. yearly inflation
Price change
$100 from 1935, at end
1935–1940
0.43%
2.2%
$102
1940–1950
5.58%
72.1%
$176
1950–1960
2.08%
22.8%
$216
1960–1970
2.74%
31.1%
$283
1970–1980
7.82%
112.4%
$601
1980–1982
8.22%
17.1%
$704
Year by year: CPI and the value of $100 from 1935
$100 from 1935 had already become $212 by
1959, on its way to $704 in 1982; 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: 1982
In 1982, prices rose 6.2% and $100 from 1935 had the buying
power of $704; the year's average CPI of 96.5 is the level
behind every 1982 figure on this page.
1982 was the hard bottom of the disinflation Paul Volcker had set in motion.
Consumer prices rose just 6.2% for the year, roughly half of 1981’s rate and a
fraction of the 13.5% peak from two years earlier. The price fell because
demand had been crushed: the recession that began in July 1981 did not
officially end until November 1982, and unemployment kept climbing even as
the economy technically began to recover, reaching 10.8% in November and
December, the highest rate since the Great Depression. Manufacturing and
construction, especially the auto and housing industries starved of credit by
double-digit interest rates, bore the worst of it. Abroad, Mexico’s August
announcement that it could not service its foreign debt opened a Latin
American debt crisis that spread across the region and forced the Federal
Reserve and IMF into emergency lending. The stress on the financial system
pushed Volcker to start easing interest rates that October, stepping back
from the strict money-supply targets he had followed since 1979. Markets read
the shift correctly: the Dow Jones Industrial Average bottomed at 776.92 in
mid-August, and the rally that followed became the opening leg of the 1980s
bull market. By year’s end, the trade-off Volcker had bet on was becoming
visible: much lower inflation, at the cost of the worst unemployment in 40
years.
MLA: “Inflation from 1935 to 1982: $100 is worth $704 today.” InflationCalculator.com, U.S. Bureau of Labor Statistics CPI-U data, https://inflationcalculator.com/inflation/1935-to-1982/
APA: InflationCalculator.com. Inflation from 1935 to 1982. Based on U.S. Bureau of Labor Statistics CPI-U data. Retrieved from https://inflationcalculator.com/inflation/1935-to-1982/