# Purchasing power of a penny in 1870? **URL:** \ **Category:** Factual Questions\ **Created:** [January 10, 2005, 10:34pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/purchasing-power-of-a-penny-in-1870/284114 "2005-01-10T22:34:02Z")\ **Posts on this page:** 1\ **Showing post:** 20
**Author:** ![tygerbryght](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/t/a9a28c/32.png) [@tygerbryght](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/tygerbryght)\ **Post date:** [January 11, 2005, 5:36am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/purchasing-power-of-a-penny-in-1870/284114/20 "2005-01-11T05:36:02Z")
> [@AllShookDown](#): > > All I can come up with is that the plain penny postcard was introduced in 1870 (now $.37) and there was a song called “A Penny For A Loaf Of Bread.” Someone else has already commented on the postage. However, a loaf of bread did sell for a penny during that era. And (what passes for) a (decent) loaf of bread nowadays goes for $2 or more. Yes, you can buy a loaf of white play-doh for $1 in Wally World, but I wouldn’t eat that, sorry. I’m frustrated enough with what’s happened to rye and “whole wheat” bread as it is. They’ve both turned soft, too. There was “penny candy,” but that wasn’t a penny a piece, it was so much for a penny. What made it _that_ expensive was the sugar, which mostly came from the Caribbean back then, and the shipping costs. Bread, OTOH, was flour (wheat was the #1 crop planted on the prairie at that time), :smack: yeast (“sour dough” yeast is wild yeast you get from leaving water with something the yeast can digest setting out open), and water. Of course, there was also the “opportunity” cost of fuel to bake the bread (not many trees on the prairie; houses were built from sod, but I don’t think you’d want to bake bread with dried dung). OTOH, when you build, etc., with wood, the wood’s not gone; when you burn it, bye-bye. All that to say this: As someone else has already commented, some prices have increased proportionately; others haven’t. :dubious: --- _[View the full topic](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/purchasing-power-of-a-penny-in-1870/284114)._