$100 in 1927 is worth $103 in 1945,
because prices increased 3.4% over that period, an average of
0.19% a year.
$100 in 1927 has
the same buying power as
$103
in 1945
Detailed inflation statistics
Cumulative price change
3.4%
Average inflation rate
0.19% per year
Converted amount ($100 base)
$103
Price difference ($100 base)
$3.45
CPI in 1927
17.4
CPI in 1945
18
Inflation in 1927
-1.69%
Inflation in 1945
2.27%
$100 in 1927 → 1945
$103
$100 in 1945 → 1927
$96.67
What happened to prices between 1927 and 1945
Between 1927 and 1945, the Consumer Price Index went from 17.4 to 18.
Cumulatively, prices increased 3.4%, which works out to an average of
0.19% per year. Put differently, a dollar in 1927 bought what
$0.97 buys in 1945: the 1927 dollar
lost 3.3% of its purchasing power over
these 18 years.
Consumer prices fell 1.7% in 1927, a mild retreat after three years of
gradual increases and part of a shallow up-and-down pattern that ran through
the second half of the decade. Aviation delivered the year’s signature
moment: Charles Lindbergh departed Roosevelt Field, New York, on May 20 and
landed at Le Bourget Field outside Paris roughly 33.5 hours later, the first
person to fly the Atlantic solo and nonstop. Detroit closed a chapter of its
own that May, when Ford halted the Model T’s production line after nearly 19
years and more than 15 million cars sold, idling tens of thousands of
workers while its factories retooled for the Model A. The Federal Reserve,
meeting with European central bankers that summer, cut its discount rate to
ease pressure on currencies still recovering from the war, a move later
cited by economists including Milton Friedman and Anna Schwartz as fuel for
the stock market speculation that built through the following two years.
First-class postage held at 2 cents.
Every 1927 amount converts to 1945 at the same ratio, 1.03: $1,000 becomes
$1,034, and $10,000 becomes $10,345.
Amount in 1927
Value in 1945
$1.00
$1.03
$5.00
$5.17
$10.00
$10.34
$20.00
$20.69
$50.00
$51.72
$100
$103
$500
$517
$1,000
$1,034
$5,000
$5,172
$10,000
$10,345
$100,000
$103,448
$1,000,000
$1,034,483
Inflation by spending category, 1927–1945
Between 1927 and 1945, apparel rose the most, up 24.1%, while food rose the least, up 5.5%, against 3.4% for all items. The headline number is an average; here is what $100 of 1927
spending costs in 1945, by category:
Category
Avg. yearly inflation
$100 in 1927 →
All items (CPI-U)
0.19%
$103
Apparel
1.21%
$124
Food
0.30%
$105
Not shown because the BLS began these indexes after 1927: core (all items less food & energy) (1957–), energy (1957–), housing (1967–), medical care (1935–), transportation (1935–), recreation (1993–), education & communication (1993–).
Decade by decade: 1927 to 1945
Prices climbed fastest in the 1940s, averaging 5.15% a year, and fell in the 1930s (1.7% a year). Each step below chains into the full 1927–1945 change:
Years
Avg. yearly inflation
Price change
$100 from 1927, at end
1927–1930
-1.36%
-4.0%
$95.98
1930–1940
-1.75%
-16.2%
$80.46
1940–1945
5.15%
28.6%
$103
Year by year: CPI and the value of $100 from 1927
$100 from 1927 had already become $79.89 by
1936, on its way to $103 in 1945; 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 9.9% in 1932, the deepest deflation of the period.
In 1945, prices rose 2.3% and $100 from 1927 had the buying
power of $103; the year's average CPI of 18 is the level
behind every 1945 figure on this page.
Consumer prices rose 2.3% in 1945, up from 1944’s 1.7% but
still modest, a rate that understated how much pressure had built up behind
wartime price and wage controls, which stayed largely in place even as the
conflict that justified them came to a close. The year opened with a shock
at home: Franklin Roosevelt died of a cerebral hemorrhage on April 12, less
than three months into an unprecedented fourth term, and Vice President
Harry Truman was sworn in that same afternoon. The war Roosevelt had led for
nearly four years ended without him. Germany surrendered on May 8, and
Japan surrendered on August 15, after atomic bombs fell on Hiroshima and
Nagasaki that month, with the formal signing aboard the USS Missouri on
September 2. Domestic policy kept moving even as the guns fell silent: the
federal minimum wage rose to 40 cents an hour that October 24, the final
step of the schedule Congress had built into the 1938 Fair Labor Standards
Act, up from 30 cents in 1939 and 25 cents at the law’s start. Consumer
prices stood 81.8% above their 1913 level, a gain that would
look modest next to what followed once wartime controls actually came off.
First-class postage held at 3 cents.
MLA: “Inflation from 1927 to 1945: $100 is worth $103 today.” InflationCalculator.com, U.S. Bureau of Labor Statistics CPI-U data, https://inflationcalculator.com/inflation/1927-to-1945/
APA: InflationCalculator.com. Inflation from 1927 to 1945. Based on U.S. Bureau of Labor Statistics CPI-U data. Retrieved from https://inflationcalculator.com/inflation/1927-to-1945/