I spent a buck today at Carl's Jr. for a...........

OldEastside

Spicy Chicken Sandwich..............I'll admit it wasn't bad for a buck.......

But..........what kind of meal could you get in 1914 for a silver buck ????

Steve

Baley

quite a bit more food, and would take you quite a bit longer to earn the dollar

good thing no one is spending in 2014 dollars that they earned way back in 1914

steveben

i saw a menu circa that time frame at the st. francis hotel at union square in san francisco. you could eat like a king for a buck. but, you would need some tip money.

AngryTurtle

The inflation calculator sez that $1.00 today equals 4 cents in 1914. I dont know if it was this era or not, but you used to be able to buy a meal for a nickel. Perhaps that was in Dave Bowers book on the Lib Nick.

DeliaBug

We have no buying power now.

1914
Avg income $14000
Avg car $500 or about 3.5% for a car
Avg house, $3500 or about 25% for a house

2012
Avg income (not household) $45000 (SWAG…)
Avg car today $32000 or about 71% for a car
Avg house today $317000 or about 700% for a house

Hmmph.

astrorat

A meal worth about $23 and change.

ms71

I sure don't know where the figure of $14,000 for average income in 1914 came from. By way of an example, the average wage for a union bricklayer in NY city in 1914 was 75 cents an hour & he worked an average of 44 hours per week. So the union bricklayer made $33 per week, just over $1,700 per year. Might the $14,000 be a typo? $1,400 seems a lot more realistic. $14,000 in 1914 dollars, adjusted for inflation, would be about $333,000 in 2014 dollars.

cecropiamoth

Is that even possible that average income in 1914 was $14,000? Doesn't sound reasonable.

hchcoin

<< <i>Is that even possible that average income in 1914 was $14,000? Doesn't sound reasonable. >>



No it is not. I think it is a typo as was mentioned above.

GrumpyEd

<< <i>
We have no buying power now.

1914
Avg income $14000
Avg car $500 or about 3.5% for a car
Avg house, $3500 or about 25% for a house

2012
Avg income (not household) $45000 (SWAG…)
Avg car today $32000 or about 71% for a car
Avg house today $317000 or about 700% for a house

Hmmph.
>>



It's from misinterpreting the charts. The charts already adjust the dollars. In today's dollars the 1914 average might be around 14K but today the average income is much higher than that so in theory you can buy more than 3 times as much today than 1914 making the average income.


Link to similar income chart

drwstr123

Wabbit2313

That old menu is cool! Filet was still the most expensive thing 100 years ago. How about the Prime Rib for 75 cents.

SkyMan

I bet if you searched the web you could find menus that were on the Titanic, which would be essentially 100 years old.

pruebas

<< <i>I bet if you searched the web you could find menus that were on the Titanic, which would be essentially 100 years old. >>


I remember (late 90s?) going to the old MANA coin show in Claymont, DE and staying overnight at the Hotel DuPont in downtown Wilmington. They had a special re-enactment dinner serving from the Titanic menu at the hotel restaurant (a very fancy place). I didn't eat there unfortunately.

messydesk

<< <i>That old menu is cool! Filet was still the most expensive thing 100 years ago. How about the Prime Rib for 75 cents. >>


"Clear green turtle in jelly." Yeah, I know it's soup, but I'm picturing some nasty jello mold with green gummi-turtles in it.

rmpsrpms

That menu makes me hungry.

What does it mean by "Ready" and "To Order"? Were the Ready items prepared ahead and the To Order specialty and needing to be cooked?

I would love to see the change used to pay for a nice meal. In 1914 FR notes were just starting to circulate, right? How do you suppose the meal would have been paid for? Since the tally for a reasonable meal would have been low in $, would it have been paid in coin or paper?