$100 in 1936 is worth $1,040 in 1993,
because prices increased 939.6% over that period, an average of
4.19% a year.
$100 in 1936 has
the same buying power as
$1,040
in 1993
Detailed inflation statistics
Cumulative price change
939.6%
Average inflation rate
4.19% per year
Converted amount ($100 base)
$1,040
Price difference ($100 base)
$940
CPI in 1936
13.9
CPI in 1993
144.5
Inflation in 1936
1.46%
Inflation in 1993
2.99%
$100 in 1936 → 1993
$1,040
$100 in 1993 → 1936
$9.62
What happened to prices between 1936 and 1993
Between 1936 and 1993, the Consumer Price Index went from 13.9 to 144.5.
Cumulatively, prices increased 939.6%, which works out to an average of
4.19% per year. Put differently, a dollar in 1936 bought what
$0.10 buys in 1993: the 1936 dollar
lost 90.4% of its purchasing power over
these 57 years.
Consumer prices rose 1.5% in 1936, a third straight annual increase and part
of a slow, steady climb back from the 1933 trough, though
prices and the broader economy still had not fully recovered to their
pre-Depression levels. Voters delivered their verdict on that recovery in
November, reelecting Franklin D. Roosevelt over Republican Alf Landon in one
of the most lopsided elections in U.S. history: Roosevelt carried 46 of 48
states and won the Electoral College 523 to 8, a broad public endorsement of
the New Deal. Public works kept advancing that year, too. Hoover Dam, one of
the era’s signature projects, had been dedicated in September 1935, but its
first generators did not begin sending electricity over transmission lines
to Los Angeles until October 1936, a milestone that showed how long even a
celebrated project took to reach full operation. Consumer prices ended the
year 40.4% above their 1913 level, still 18.7% below the
1929 peak, a gap that would keep narrowing until a sharp new recession
interrupted the recovery the following year. First-class postage held at 3
cents.
Every 1936 amount converts to 1993 at the same ratio, 10.40: $1,000 becomes
$10,396, and $10,000 becomes $103,957.
Amount in 1936
Value in 1993
$1.00
$10.40
$5.00
$51.98
$10.00
$104
$20.00
$208
$50.00
$520
$100
$1,040
$500
$5,198
$1,000
$10,396
$5,000
$51,978
$10,000
$103,957
$100,000
$1,039,568
$1,000,000
$10,395,683
Inflation by spending category, 1936–1993
Between 1936 and 1993, medical care rose the most, up 1874.5%, while apparel rose the least, up 536.7%, against 939.6% for all items. The headline number is an average; here is what $100 of 1936
spending costs in 1993, by category:
Category
Avg. yearly inflation
$100 in 1936 →
All items (CPI-U)
4.19%
$1,040
Medical care
5.37%
$1,975
Food
4.33%
$1,118
Transportation
3.95%
$912
Apparel
3.30%
$637
Not shown because the BLS began these indexes after 1936: core (all items less food & energy) (1957–), energy (1957–), housing (1967–), recreation (1993–), education & communication (1993–).
Decade by decade: 1936 to 1993
Prices climbed fastest in the 1970s, averaging 7.82% a year, and slowest in the 1930s (0.18% a year). Each step below chains into the full 1936–1993 change:
Years
Avg. yearly inflation
Price change
$100 from 1936, at end
1936–1940
0.18%
0.7%
$101
1940–1950
5.58%
72.1%
$173
1950–1960
2.08%
22.8%
$213
1960–1970
2.74%
31.1%
$279
1970–1980
7.82%
112.4%
$593
1980–1990
4.72%
58.6%
$940
1990–1993
3.40%
10.6%
$1,040
Year by year: CPI and the value of $100 from 1936
$100 from 1936 had already become $223 by
1964, on its way to $1,040 in 1993; 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: 1993
In 1993, prices rose 3.0% and $100 from 1936 had the buying
power of $1,040; the year's average CPI of 144.5 is the level
behind every 1993 figure on this page.
By 1993, the median household earned about $31,200, gas averaged $1.11 a gallon, and a new home
cost roughly $126,500. Inflation ran at 3.0% for the year, holding close to where it had settled
the year before as the recovery slowly gathered strength. Washington spent much of the year on
two pieces of unfinished business from the recession: a deficit-reduction package, the Omnibus
Budget Reconciliation Act, that raised the top income tax rate to 39.6% to start narrowing a
budget gap left over from the 1980s, and a trade deal, the North American Free Trade Agreement,
that President Clinton signed into law in December after a contentious fight in Congress. NAFTA
phased out most tariffs between the U.S., Mexico, and Canada and took effect the following
January. The year’s other defining event had nothing to do with the economy: in February, a bomb
exploded in the World Trade Center’s parking garage, killing six people and injuring more than a
thousand. By year’s end, the pieces of the decade’s later economic story, freer trade, a
shrinking deficit, and inflation holding near 3%, were already in place.
MLA: “Inflation from 1936 to 1993: $100 is worth $1,040 today.” InflationCalculator.com, U.S. Bureau of Labor Statistics CPI-U data, https://inflationcalculator.com/inflation/1936-to-1993/
APA: InflationCalculator.com. Inflation from 1936 to 1993. Based on U.S. Bureau of Labor Statistics CPI-U data. Retrieved from https://inflationcalculator.com/inflation/1936-to-1993/