$100 in 1927 is worth $128 in 1947,
because prices increased 28.2% over that period, an average of
1.25% a year.
$100 in 1927 has
the same buying power as
$128
in 1947
Detailed inflation statistics
Cumulative price change
28.2%
Average inflation rate
1.25% per year
Converted amount ($100 base)
$128
Price difference ($100 base)
$28.16
CPI in 1927
17.4
CPI in 1947
22.3
Inflation in 1927
-1.69%
Inflation in 1947
14.36%
$100 in 1927 → 1947
$128
$100 in 1947 → 1927
$78.03
What happened to prices between 1927 and 1947
Between 1927 and 1947, the Consumer Price Index went from 17.4 to 22.3.
Cumulatively, prices increased 28.2%, which works out to an average of
1.25% per year. Put differently, a dollar in 1927 bought what
$0.78 buys in 1947: the 1927 dollar
lost 22.0% of its purchasing power over
these 20 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 1947 at the same ratio, 1.28: $1,000 becomes
$1,282, and $10,000 becomes $12,816.
Amount in 1927
Value in 1947
$1.00
$1.28
$5.00
$6.41
$10.00
$12.82
$20.00
$25.63
$50.00
$64.08
$100
$128
$500
$641
$1,000
$1,282
$5,000
$6,408
$10,000
$12,816
$100,000
$128,161
$1,000,000
$1,281,609
Inflation by spending category, 1927–1947
Between 1927 and 1947, apparel rose the most, up 57.7%, while food rose the least, up 47.0%, against 28.2% for all items. The headline number is an average; here is what $100 of 1927
spending costs in 1947, by category:
Category
Avg. yearly inflation
$100 in 1927 →
All items (CPI-U)
1.25%
$128
Apparel
2.30%
$158
Food
1.94%
$147
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 1947
Prices climbed fastest in the 1940s, averaging 6.88% a year, and fell in the 1930s (1.7% a year). Each step below chains into the full 1927–1947 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
1940–1947
6.88%
59.3%
$128
Year by year: CPI and the value of $100 from 1927
$100 from 1927 had already become $82.76 by
1937, on its way to $128 in 1947; each row shows the CPI, that
year's inflation rate, and the running value.
Within the span, inflation peaked at 14.4% in 1947, and prices fell 9.9% in 1932, the deepest deflation of the period.
In 1947, prices rose 14.4% and $100 from 1927 had the buying
power of $128; the year's average CPI of 22.3 is the level
behind every 1947 figure on this page.
Consumer prices rose 14.4% in 1947, up from 1946’s 8.3% and
the fastest annual increase since 1920, as the last of the wartime price
controls disappeared and a year of strikes, wage catch-up, and lingering
shortages hit consumers all at once. Congress answered the previous year’s
strike wave that June, overriding President Truman’s veto to pass the
Taft-Hartley Act, which banned secondary boycotts and the closed shop and
let states adopt “right-to-work” laws curbing union power. American
attention was also turning outward. In a June 5 speech at Harvard,
Secretary of State George Marshall outlined a U.S.-funded plan to rebuild
Western Europe’s economies, an effort that would become known as the
Marshall Plan once Congress funded it the following year. The government
reorganized itself for the confrontation with the Soviet Union that plan was
partly designed to prevent: the National Security Act, signed July 26,
created the Department of Defense, the Air Force as a separate service, the
Central Intelligence Agency, and the National Security Council. Consumer
prices stood 125.3% above their 1913 level and 30.4% above
1929’s pre-Depression peak, up from just 1.2% above it four
years earlier. First-class postage held at 3 cents, and the minimum wage
stayed at 40 cents an hour.
MLA: “Inflation from 1927 to 1947: $100 is worth $128 today.” InflationCalculator.com, U.S. Bureau of Labor Statistics CPI-U data, https://inflationcalculator.com/inflation/1927-to-1947/
APA: InflationCalculator.com. Inflation from 1927 to 1947. Based on U.S. Bureau of Labor Statistics CPI-U data. Retrieved from https://inflationcalculator.com/inflation/1927-to-1947/