$100 in 1917 is worth $207 in 1952,
because prices increased 107.0% over that period, an average of
2.10% a year.
$100 in 1917 has
the same buying power as
$207
in 1952
Detailed inflation statistics
Cumulative price change
107.0%
Average inflation rate
2.10% per year
Converted amount ($100 base)
$207
Price difference ($100 base)
$107
CPI in 1917
12.8
CPI in 1952
26.5
Inflation in 1917
17.43%
Inflation in 1952
1.92%
$100 in 1917 → 1952
$207
$100 in 1952 → 1917
$48.30
What happened to prices between 1917 and 1952
Between 1917 and 1952, the Consumer Price Index went from 12.8 to 26.5.
Cumulatively, prices increased 107.0%, which works out to an average of
2.10% per year. Put differently, a dollar in 1917 bought what
$0.48 buys in 1952: the 1917 dollar
lost 51.7% of its purchasing power over
these 35 years.
1917 is when World War I inflation stopped being a background trend and
became the dominant fact of American economic life. Consumer prices rose
17.4% for the year, more than double the previous year’s already sharp
increase, as the country’s April 6 entry into the war layered federal war
spending on top of an economy already strained by military demand and
worker shortages. Congress paid for the war with the War Revenue Act that
October, which sharply raised income taxes, created a new tax on wartime
business profits, and, in a small but very visible change for ordinary
households, raised the cost of a first-class stamp from 2 cents to 3 cents
that November, the rate’s first move since 1885. Herbert Hoover took over
the new Food Administration in August and asked Americans to conserve food
voluntarily rather than face formal rationing, a campaign that became
famous enough that “Hooverize” entered the language as a verb for cutting
back. None of it slowed prices much: the 17.4% increase would be topped
again the very next year, in 1918.
Every 1917 amount converts to 1952 at the same ratio, 2.07: $1,000 becomes
$2,070, and $10,000 becomes $20,703.
Amount in 1917
Value in 1952
$1.00
$2.07
$5.00
$10.35
$10.00
$20.70
$20.00
$41.41
$50.00
$104
$100
$207
$500
$1,035
$1,000
$2,070
$5,000
$10,352
$10,000
$20,703
$100,000
$207,031
$1,000,000
$2,070,313
Inflation by spending category, 1917–1952
Between 1917 and 1952, apparel rose the most, up 115.3%, while food rose the least, up 97.9%, against 107.0% for all items. The headline number is an average; here is what $100 of 1917
spending costs in 1952, by category:
Category
Avg. yearly inflation
$100 in 1917 →
All items (CPI-U)
2.10%
$207
Apparel
2.22%
$215
Food
1.97%
$198
Not shown because the BLS began these indexes after 1917: core (all items less food & energy) (1957–), energy (1957–), housing (1967–), medical care (1935–), transportation (1935–), recreation (1993–), education & communication (1993–).
Decade by decade: 1917 to 1952
Prices climbed fastest in the 1910s, averaging 16.04% a year, and fell in the 1920s (1.8% a year). Each step below chains into the full 1917–1952 change:
Years
Avg. yearly inflation
Price change
$100 from 1917, at end
1917–1920
16.04%
56.3%
$156
1920–1930
-1.79%
-16.5%
$130
1930–1940
-1.75%
-16.2%
$109
1940–1950
5.58%
72.1%
$188
1950–1952
4.86%
10.0%
$207
Year by year: CPI and the value of $100 from 1917
$100 from 1917 had already become $107 by
1935, on its way to $207 in 1952; 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.
Long periods are sampled every 2 years; the calculator above covers any pair of years.
The destination year: 1952
In 1952, prices rose 1.9% and $100 from 1917 had the buying
power of $207; the year's average CPI of 26.5 is the level
behind every 1952 figure on this page.
Consumer prices rose 1.9% in 1952, down sharply from 1951’s
7.9% as the price and wage controls imposed the year before held the cost
of living in check even with the Korean War still underway. Labor strife
tested those controls that spring: to head off a strike that could have
disrupted war production, President Truman ordered the government to
seize the steel industry that April, over the objections of steel
companies fighting the price the Office of Price Stabilization had set for
their product. The Supreme Court ruled the seizure unconstitutional in
Youngstown Sheet & Tube Co. v. Sawyer that June, a landmark limit on
presidential power, and steelworkers then struck for 53 days before a
settlement. Politics delivered the year’s biggest change that November:
Dwight Eisenhower defeated Adlai Stevenson, promising to “go to Korea” to
end the war and returning Republicans to the White House for the first
time since 1933. The Cold War’s technological edge sharpened that same
month, when the United States tested the first hydrogen bomb at Enewetak
Atoll on November 1, a device hundreds of times more powerful than the
atomic bombs used against Japan in 1945. Consumer prices finished 1952
167.7% above their 1913 level. First-class postage held at
3 cents, and the minimum wage stayed at 75 cents an hour.
MLA: “Inflation from 1917 to 1952: $100 is worth $207 today.” InflationCalculator.com, U.S. Bureau of Labor Statistics CPI-U data, https://inflationcalculator.com/inflation/1917-to-1952/
APA: InflationCalculator.com. Inflation from 1917 to 1952. Based on U.S. Bureau of Labor Statistics CPI-U data. Retrieved from https://inflationcalculator.com/inflation/1917-to-1952/