$100 in 1916 is worth $179 in 1946,
because prices increased 78.9% over that period, an average of
1.96% a year.
$100 in 1916 has
the same buying power as
$179
in 1946
Detailed inflation statistics
Cumulative price change
78.9%
Average inflation rate
1.96% per year
Converted amount ($100 base)
$179
Price difference ($100 base)
$78.90
CPI in 1916
10.9
CPI in 1946
19.5
Inflation in 1916
7.92%
Inflation in 1946
8.33%
$100 in 1916 → 1946
$179
$100 in 1946 → 1916
$55.90
What happened to prices between 1916 and 1946
Between 1916 and 1946, the Consumer Price Index went from 10.9 to 19.5.
Cumulatively, prices increased 78.9%, which works out to an average of
1.96% per year. Put differently, a dollar in 1916 bought what
$0.56 buys in 1946: the 1916 dollar
lost 44.1% of its purchasing power over
these 30 years.
1916 was when World War I first showed up clearly in American price tags.
Consumer prices rose 7.9% for the year, easily the sharpest increase since
the Bureau of Labor Statistics’ CPI history begins in 1913, as factories ran
flat out to fill steel, munitions, and food orders from Britain and France.
Railroad workers felt the squeeze from rising living costs enough to threaten
a nationwide strike; Congress headed it off in September with the Adamson
Act, which set an eight-hour standard workday for interstate rail employees,
the first federal law of its kind covering private-sector hours. Washington
was also preparing more directly for war: the National Defense Act, signed
in June, expanded the Army and National Guard and funded new
government-owned munitions plants, adding another source of demand to an
economy already running hot. Woodrow Wilson won re-election in November
largely on having kept the country out of the fighting so far, a promise
that would not survive the following spring. A first-class stamp still cost
2 cents, one of the few prices that had not yet moved.
Every 1916 amount converts to 1946 at the same ratio, 1.79: $1,000 becomes
$1,789, and $10,000 becomes $17,890.
Amount in 1916
Value in 1946
$1.00
$1.79
$5.00
$8.94
$10.00
$17.89
$20.00
$35.78
$50.00
$89.45
$100
$179
$500
$894
$1,000
$1,789
$5,000
$8,945
$10,000
$17,890
$100,000
$178,899
$1,000,000
$1,788,991
Inflation by spending category, 1916–1946
Between 1916 and 1946, apparel rose the most, up 104.8%, while food rose the least, up 75.2%, against 78.9% for all items. The headline number is an average; here is what $100 of 1916
spending costs in 1946, by category:
Category
Avg. yearly inflation
$100 in 1916 →
All items (CPI-U)
1.96%
$179
Apparel
2.42%
$205
Food
1.89%
$175
Not shown because the BLS began these indexes after 1916: core (all items less food & energy) (1957–), energy (1957–), housing (1967–), medical care (1935–), transportation (1935–), recreation (1993–), education & communication (1993–).
Decade by decade: 1916 to 1946
Prices climbed fastest in the 1910s, averaging 16.39% a year, and fell in the 1920s (1.8% a year). Each step below chains into the full 1916–1946 change:
Years
Avg. yearly inflation
Price change
$100 from 1916, at end
1916–1920
16.39%
83.5%
$183
1920–1930
-1.79%
-16.5%
$153
1930–1940
-1.75%
-16.2%
$128
1940–1946
5.68%
39.3%
$179
Year by year: CPI and the value of $100 from 1916
$100 from 1916 had already become $139 by
1931, on its way to $179 in 1946; each row shows the CPI, that
year's inflation rate, and the running value.
Within the span, inflation peaked at 18.0% in 1918, and prices fell 10.5% in 1921, the deepest deflation of the period.
In 1946, prices rose 8.3% and $100 from 1916 had the buying
power of $179; the year's average CPI of 19.5 is the level
behind every 1946 figure on this page.
Consumer prices rose 8.3% in 1946, up sharply from 1945’s
2.3% and the sharpest increase since 1942, as wartime price controls
finally came apart. Congress let the Office of Price Administration’s
authority lapse at the end of June, reinstated a weaker version soon after,
then wound the whole system down through the rest of the year, releasing
years of pent-up demand into the price level almost at once. Meat was the
clearest casualty of the fight over decontrol: farmers withheld livestock
rather than sell at capped prices, producing severe shortages that spring
and summer until ceilings on meat were lifted that October, after which
supplies reappeared almost overnight. Labor cashed in its own wartime
restraint the same year. An estimated 4.6 million workers walked out at
some point in 1946, hitting steel, coal, automakers, and the railroads in
the largest strike wave in U.S. history, as unions pushed for wage gains to
offset cost-of-living increases controls could no longer contain. Amid the
turmoil, Congress made a less visible but lasting change to economic
policy: the Employment Act of 1946, signed that February, committed the
federal government to promoting maximum employment and created the Council
of Economic Advisers. Consumer prices stood 97.0% above their
1913 level, nearly double where the index had started 33
years earlier. First-class postage held at 3 cents, and the minimum wage
stayed at 40 cents an hour.
MLA: “Inflation from 1916 to 1946: $100 is worth $179 today.” InflationCalculator.com, U.S. Bureau of Labor Statistics CPI-U data, https://inflationcalculator.com/inflation/1916-to-1946/
APA: InflationCalculator.com. Inflation from 1916 to 1946. Based on U.S. Bureau of Labor Statistics CPI-U data. Retrieved from https://inflationcalculator.com/inflation/1916-to-1946/