$100 in 1918 is worth $129 in 1946,
because prices increased 29.1% over that period, an average of
0.92% a year.
$100 in 1918 has
the same buying power as
$129
in 1946
Detailed inflation statistics
Cumulative price change
29.1%
Average inflation rate
0.92% per year
Converted amount ($100 base)
$129
Price difference ($100 base)
$29.14
CPI in 1918
15.1
CPI in 1946
19.5
Inflation in 1918
17.97%
Inflation in 1946
8.33%
$100 in 1918 → 1946
$129
$100 in 1946 → 1918
$77.44
What happened to prices between 1918 and 1946
Between 1918 and 1946, the Consumer Price Index went from 15.1 to 19.5.
Cumulatively, prices increased 29.1%, which works out to an average of
0.92% per year. Put differently, a dollar in 1918 bought what
$0.77 buys in 1946: the 1918 dollar
lost 22.6% of its purchasing power over
these 28 years.
1918 brought the steepest annual price increase the CPI had recorded:
consumer prices rose 18.0% for the year, edging out 1917’s already sharp
17.4% as the economy stayed at full wartime mobilization for most of the
year. A first-class stamp cost 3 cents, up from 2 cents the previous
November under the War Revenue Act’s wartime tax increases. The war itself
ended on November 11, when Germany signed an armistice with the Allied
powers after more than four years of fighting in Europe, but the inflation
built up over a year and a half of mobilization did not disappear along with
the fighting. The bigger public health story that year was the influenza
pandemic that reached the U.S. in a mild spring wave and then returned that
fall in a far deadlier form, eventually killing roughly 675,000 Americans,
more than the country’s combat losses in the war. It hit factories, docks,
and shops alongside households, adding disruption to an economy already
strained by wartime demand. Prices would keep climbing even after the
armistice, into the postwar surge of 1919.
Every 1918 amount converts to 1946 at the same ratio, 1.29: $1,000 becomes
$1,291, and $10,000 becomes $12,914.
Amount in 1918
Value in 1946
$1.00
$1.29
$5.00
$6.46
$10.00
$12.91
$20.00
$25.83
$50.00
$64.57
$100
$129
$500
$646
$1,000
$1,291
$5,000
$6,457
$10,000
$12,914
$100,000
$129,139
$1,000,000
$1,291,391
Inflation by spending category, 1918–1946
Between 1918 and 1946, apparel rose the most, up 26.0%, while food rose the least, up 18.6%, against 29.1% for all items. The headline number is an average; here is what $100 of 1918
spending costs in 1946, by category:
Category
Avg. yearly inflation
$100 in 1918 →
All items (CPI-U)
0.92%
$129
Apparel
0.83%
$126
Food
0.61%
$119
Not shown because the BLS began these indexes after 1918: core (all items less food & energy) (1957–), energy (1957–), housing (1967–), medical care (1935–), transportation (1935–), recreation (1993–), education & communication (1993–).
Decade by decade: 1918 to 1946
Prices climbed fastest in the 1910s, averaging 15.09% a year, and fell in the 1920s (1.8% a year). Each step below chains into the full 1918–1946 change:
Years
Avg. yearly inflation
Price change
$100 from 1918, at end
1918–1920
15.09%
32.5%
$132
1920–1930
-1.79%
-16.5%
$111
1930–1940
-1.75%
-16.2%
$92.72
1940–1946
5.68%
39.3%
$129
Year by year: CPI and the value of $100 from 1918
$100 from 1918 had already become $90.73 by
1932, on its way to $129 in 1946; each row shows the CPI, that
year's inflation rate, and the running value.
Within the span, inflation peaked at 15.6% in 1920, and prices fell 10.5% in 1921, the deepest deflation of the period.
In 1946, prices rose 8.3% and $100 from 1918 had the buying
power of $129; 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 1918 to 1946: $100 is worth $129 today.” InflationCalculator.com, U.S. Bureau of Labor Statistics CPI-U data, https://inflationcalculator.com/inflation/1918-to-1946/
APA: InflationCalculator.com. Inflation from 1918 to 1946. Based on U.S. Bureau of Labor Statistics CPI-U data. Retrieved from https://inflationcalculator.com/inflation/1918-to-1946/