$100 in 1933 is worth $108 in 1940,
because prices increased 7.7% over that period, an average of
1.06% a year.
$100 in 1933 has
the same buying power as
$108
in 1940
Detailed inflation statistics
Cumulative price change
7.7%
Average inflation rate
1.06% per year
Converted amount ($100 base)
$108
Price difference ($100 base)
$7.69
CPI in 1933
13
CPI in 1940
14
Inflation in 1933
-5.11%
Inflation in 1940
0.72%
$100 in 1933 → 1940
$108
$100 in 1940 → 1933
$92.86
What happened to prices between 1933 and 1940
Between 1933 and 1940, the Consumer Price Index went from 13 to 14.
Cumulatively, prices increased 7.7%, which works out to an average of
1.06% per year. Put differently, a dollar in 1933 bought what
$0.93 buys in 1940: the 1933 dollar
lost 7.1% of its purchasing power over
these 7 years.
Consumer prices fell 5.1% in 1933, a smaller decline than 1932’s
but enough to complete a four-year slide of 24.0% from the 1929
peak. The National Bureau of Economic Research dates the trough of that
contraction to March 1933, closing out the longest downturn in its
chronology, one that had run 43 months since August 1929. The bottom
arrived alongside a change in government: Franklin D. Roosevelt was
inaugurated March 4 and, within 48 hours, ordered every bank in the country
closed to halt a fresh round of runs. Congress passed the Emergency Banking
Act on March 9, letting solvent banks reopen under federal supervision, and
the panic that had been building for months broke almost immediately. The
administration moved on the currency next: Executive Order 6102, issued
April 5, required Americans to turn in most gold coin, bullion, and
certificates to the Federal Reserve, taking the country off the domestic
gold standard (formal devaluation of the dollar followed the next January).
Congress capped the year’s banking overhaul in June with the Banking Act of
1933, commonly called Glass-Steagall, which created the Federal Deposit
Insurance Corporation and separated commercial banking from investment
banking. Even after four straight years of falling prices, the CPI still
stood 31.3% above its 1913 level. First-class postage held at
3 cents.
Every 1933 amount converts to 1940 at the same ratio, 1.08: $1,000 becomes
$1,077, and $10,000 becomes $10,769.
Amount in 1933
Value in 1940
$1.00
$1.08
$5.00
$5.38
$10.00
$10.77
$20.00
$21.54
$50.00
$53.85
$100
$108
$500
$538
$1,000
$1,077
$5,000
$5,385
$10,000
$10,769
$100,000
$107,692
$1,000,000
$1,076,923
Inflation by spending category, 1933–1940
Between 1933 and 1940, apparel rose the most, up 16.0%, while food rose the least, up 15.4%, against 7.7% for all items. The headline number is an average; here is what $100 of 1933
spending costs in 1940, by category:
Category
Avg. yearly inflation
$100 in 1933 →
All items (CPI-U)
1.06%
$108
Apparel
2.14%
$116
Food
2.07%
$115
Not shown because the BLS began these indexes after 1933: core (all items less food & energy) (1957–), energy (1957–), housing (1967–), medical care (1935–), transportation (1935–), recreation (1993–), education & communication (1993–).
Year by year: CPI and the value of $100 from 1933
$100 from 1933 had already become $107 by
1936, on its way to $108 in 1940; each row shows the CPI, that
year's inflation rate, and the running value.
Within the span, inflation peaked at 3.6% in 1937, and prices fell 2.1% in 1938, the deepest deflation of the period.
In 1940, prices rose 0.7% and $100 from 1933 had the buying
power of $108; the year's average CPI of 14 is the level
behind every 1940 figure on this page.
Consumer prices rose 0.7% in 1940, snapping 1939’s decline
and marking the first increase since 1937. The gain was modest, and the CPI
still stood 18.1% below its 1929 peak, a reminder of how far
the recovery from the Depression’s trough had left to go even as defense
orders from Britain and France began reaching American factories. War was
already reshaping domestic policy well before it touched American soil.
Congress passed the Selective Training and Service Act that September, the
country’s first peacetime draft, requiring men aged 21 to 35 to register and
authorizing the induction of up to 900,000 men a year, more than a year
before Pearl Harbor. That November, Franklin Roosevelt won an unprecedented
third term, defeating Republican Wendell Willkie after campaigning on
keeping the United States out of the war then consuming Europe and Asia. The
promise would not hold much longer: within two years, wartime demand would
push consumer prices up faster than at any point since the aftermath of
World War I. First-class postage held at 3 cents, and the federal minimum
wage stayed at 30 cents an hour, the level set the previous October under
the Fair Labor Standards Act.
MLA: “Inflation from 1933 to 1940: $100 is worth $108 today.” InflationCalculator.com, U.S. Bureau of Labor Statistics CPI-U data, https://inflationcalculator.com/inflation/1933-to-1940/
APA: InflationCalculator.com. Inflation from 1933 to 1940. Based on U.S. Bureau of Labor Statistics CPI-U data. Retrieved from https://inflationcalculator.com/inflation/1933-to-1940/