$100 in 1920 is worth $97.50 in 1946,
because prices declined 2.5% over that period, an average of
0.10% a year.
$100 in 1920 has
the same buying power as
$97.50
in 1946
Detailed inflation statistics
Cumulative price change
-2.5%
Average inflation rate
-0.10% per year
Converted amount ($100 base)
$97.50
Price difference ($100 base)
-$2.50
CPI in 1920
20
CPI in 1946
19.5
Inflation in 1920
15.61%
Inflation in 1946
8.33%
$100 in 1920 → 1946
$97.50
$100 in 1946 → 1920
$103
What happened to prices between 1920 and 1946
Between 1920 and 1946, the Consumer Price Index went from 20 to 19.5.
Cumulatively, prices declined 2.5%, which works out to an average of
-0.10% per year. Put differently, a dollar in 1920 bought what
$1.03 buys in 1946: the 1920 dollar
gained 2.6% in purchasing power over
these 26 years.
1920 was the last year of the inflation that had built since the war began:
consumer prices rose 15.6% for the year, leaving the CPI more than double its
1913 starting level after seven straight years of increases.
The boom behind those increases turned to bust before the year was over. The
Federal Reserve, worried about speculation, pushed its discount rate to a
record 7% that spring, and wholesale prices, which had led the wartime
runup, began collapsing within months. The National Bureau of Economic
Research dates the resulting downturn from January 1920 to July 1921, one of
the shortest but steepest contractions in U.S. history, and consumer prices
followed into outright decline, falling 10.5% in 1921. Two constitutional
changes reshaped the country that year, too. The 18th Amendment’s ban on
alcohol took legal effect January 17, enforced under the Volstead Act
Congress had passed the previous October. Then, on August 18, Tennessee’s
ratification of the 19th Amendment secured women’s right to vote nationwide,
and women cast ballots in a presidential election for the first time that
November, when Warren Harding won on a promise to return the country to
“normalcy” after a decade of war, pandemic, and rising prices. First-class
postage held at 2 cents, unchanged since mid-1919.
Every 1920 amount converts to 1946 at the same ratio, 0.97: $1,000 becomes
$975, and $10,000 becomes $9,750.
Amount in 1920
Value in 1946
$1.00
$0.98
$5.00
$4.88
$10.00
$9.75
$20.00
$19.50
$50.00
$48.75
$100
$97.50
$500
$488
$1,000
$975
$5,000
$4,875
$10,000
$9,750
$100,000
$97,500
$1,000,000
$975,000
Inflation by spending category, 1920–1946
Every category fell between 1920 and 1946: apparel the most, down 20.2%, and food the least, down 5.7%. The headline number is an average; here is what $100 of 1920
spending costs in 1946, by category:
Category
Avg. yearly inflation
$100 in 1920 →
All items (CPI-U)
-0.10%
$97.50
Food
-0.23%
$94.29
Apparel
-0.86%
$79.81
Not shown because the BLS began these indexes after 1920: core (all items less food & energy) (1957–), energy (1957–), housing (1967–), medical care (1935–), transportation (1935–), recreation (1993–), education & communication (1993–).
Decade by decade: 1920 to 1946
Prices climbed fastest in the 1940s, averaging 5.68% a year, and fell in the 1920s (1.8% a year). Each step below chains into the full 1920–1946 change:
Years
Avg. yearly inflation
Price change
$100 from 1920, at end
1920–1930
-1.79%
-16.5%
$83.50
1930–1940
-1.75%
-16.2%
$70.00
1940–1946
5.68%
39.3%
$97.50
Year by year: CPI and the value of $100 from 1920
$100 from 1920 had already become $65.00 by
1933, on its way to $97.50 in 1946; each row shows the CPI, that
year's inflation rate, and the running value.
Within the span, inflation peaked at 10.9% in 1942, and prices fell 10.5% in 1921, the deepest deflation of the period.
In 1946, prices rose 8.3% and $100 from 1920 had the buying
power of $97.50; 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 1920 to 1946: $100 is worth $97.50 today.” InflationCalculator.com, U.S. Bureau of Labor Statistics CPI-U data, https://inflationcalculator.com/inflation/1920-to-1946/
APA: InflationCalculator.com. Inflation from 1920 to 1946. Based on U.S. Bureau of Labor Statistics CPI-U data. Retrieved from https://inflationcalculator.com/inflation/1920-to-1946/