$100 in 1936 is worth $1,543 in 2009,
because prices increased 1443.4% over that period, an average of
3.82% a year.
$100 in 1936 has
the same buying power as
$1,543
in 2009
Detailed inflation statistics
Cumulative price change
1443.4%
Average inflation rate
3.82% per year
Converted amount ($100 base)
$1,543
Price difference ($100 base)
$1,443
CPI in 1936
13.9
CPI in 2009
214.537
Inflation in 1936
1.46%
Inflation in 2009
-0.36%
$100 in 1936 → 2009
$1,543
$100 in 2009 → 1936
$6.48
What happened to prices between 1936 and 2009
Between 1936 and 2009, the Consumer Price Index went from 13.9 to 214.537.
Cumulatively, prices increased 1443.4%, which works out to an average of
3.82% per year. Put differently, a dollar in 1936 bought what
$0.06 buys in 2009: the 1936 dollar
lost 93.5% of its purchasing power over
these 73 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 2009 at the same ratio, 15.43: $1,000 becomes
$15,434, and $10,000 becomes $154,343.
Amount in 1936
Value in 2009
$1.00
$15.43
$5.00
$77.17
$10.00
$154
$20.00
$309
$50.00
$772
$100
$1,543
$500
$7,717
$1,000
$15,434
$5,000
$77,172
$10,000
$154,343
$100,000
$1,543,432
$1,000,000
$15,434,317
Inflation by spending category, 1936–2009
Between 1936 and 2009, medical care rose the most, up 3582.5%, while apparel rose the least, up 471.8%, against 1443.4% for all items. The headline number is an average; here is what $100 of 1936
spending costs in 2009, by category:
Category
Avg. yearly inflation
$100 in 1936 →
All items (CPI-U)
3.82%
$1,543
Medical care
5.06%
$3,682
Food
3.98%
$1,730
Transportation
3.52%
$1,254
Apparel
2.42%
$572
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 2009
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 1936–2009 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
1990–2000
2.80%
31.8%
$1,239
2000–2009
2.47%
24.6%
$1,543
Year by year: CPI and the value of $100 from 1936
$100 from 1936 had already become $291 by
1971, on its way to $1,543 in 2009; 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 5 years; the calculator above covers any pair of years.
The destination year: 2009
In 2009, prices fell 0.4% and $100 from 1936 had the buying
power of $1,543; the year's average CPI of 214.537 is the level
behind every 2009 figure on this page.
2009 is the rarest kind of year in the modern price data: one where the cost
of living went down. The CPI fell 0.4%, the first full-year deflation
since 1955, as the Great Recession hollowed out demand and oil unwound from
its $147 spike the summer before. Gasoline that had cost over $4 a gallon in
July 2008 averaged $2.35 in 2009, and that energy collapse dragged the
12-month inflation rate to −2.1% by July, the deepest reading since 1950.
Policymakers treated falling prices not as relief but as a warning: deflation
raises the real weight of debt precisely when households are drowning in it,
which is why the Federal Reserve pinned interest rates near zero, began buying
bonds by the hundreds of billions, and Washington passed a $787 billion
stimulus. The medicine took: prices stabilized within a year, and 2009 remains
the textbook case of why central banks fear deflation more than moderate
inflation.
MLA: “Inflation from 1936 to 2009: $100 is worth $1,543 today.” InflationCalculator.com, U.S. Bureau of Labor Statistics CPI-U data, https://inflationcalculator.com/inflation/1936-to-2009/
APA: InflationCalculator.com. Inflation from 1936 to 2009. Based on U.S. Bureau of Labor Statistics CPI-U data. Retrieved from https://inflationcalculator.com/inflation/1936-to-2009/