$100 in 1933 is worth $135 in 1944,
because prices increased 35.4% over that period, an average of
2.79% a year.
$100 in 1933 has
the same buying power as
$135
in 1944
Detailed inflation statistics
Cumulative price change
35.4%
Average inflation rate
2.79% per year
Converted amount ($100 base)
$135
Price difference ($100 base)
$35.38
CPI in 1933
13
CPI in 1944
17.6
Inflation in 1933
-5.11%
Inflation in 1944
1.73%
$100 in 1933 → 1944
$135
$100 in 1944 → 1933
$73.86
What happened to prices between 1933 and 1944
Between 1933 and 1944, the Consumer Price Index went from 13 to 17.6.
Cumulatively, prices increased 35.4%, which works out to an average of
2.79% per year. Put differently, a dollar in 1933 bought what
$0.74 buys in 1944: the 1933 dollar
lost 26.1% of its purchasing power over
these 11 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 1944 at the same ratio, 1.35: $1,000 becomes
$1,354, and $10,000 becomes $13,538.
Amount in 1933
Value in 1944
$1.00
$1.35
$5.00
$6.77
$10.00
$13.54
$20.00
$27.08
$50.00
$67.69
$100
$135
$500
$677
$1,000
$1,354
$5,000
$6,769
$10,000
$13,538
$100,000
$135,385
$1,000,000
$1,353,846
Inflation by spending category, 1933–1944
Between 1933 and 1944, food rose the most, up 62.5%, while apparel rose the least, up 58.5%, against 35.4% for all items. The headline number is an average; here is what $100 of 1933
spending costs in 1944, by category:
Category
Avg. yearly inflation
$100 in 1933 →
All items (CPI-U)
2.79%
$135
Food
4.51%
$162
Apparel
4.28%
$159
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–).
Decade by decade: 1933 to 1944
Prices climbed fastest in the 1940s, averaging 5.89% a year, and slowest in the 1930s (1.06% a year). Each step below chains into the full 1933–1944 change:
Years
Avg. yearly inflation
Price change
$100 from 1933, at end
1933–1940
1.06%
7.7%
$108
1940–1944
5.89%
25.7%
$135
Year by year: CPI and the value of $100 from 1933
$100 from 1933 had already become $108 by
1938, on its way to $135 in 1944; 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 2.1% in 1938, the deepest deflation of the period.
In 1944, prices rose 1.7% and $100 from 1933 had the buying
power of $135; the year's average CPI of 17.6 is the level
behind every 1944 figure on this page.
Consumer prices rose just 1.7% in 1944, down from 1943’s
6.1% and the slowest increase of the war years, as price and wage controls
held the cost of living nearly flat even as the conflict reached its most
expensive phase. The war itself turned decisively that June, when more than
150,000 Allied troops landed on the beaches of Normandy, France, opening the
long-planned second front against Nazi Germany. Congress used the same
month to plan for the war’s end, passing the GI Bill on June 22 to give
returning veterans money for college or vocational training, low-cost home
and business loans, and unemployment benefits, a package that would reshape
American housing and higher education for a generation. The following
month, delegates from 44 Allied nations gathered at Bretton Woods, New
Hampshire, and agreed to peg their currencies to the U.S. dollar, itself
pegged to gold, creating the International Monetary Fund and the World Bank
to manage the new system. Consumer prices stood 77.8% above their
1913 level, a cumulative wartime rise held down by controls
that would start unwinding the following year. First-class postage held at
3 cents, and the minimum wage stayed at 30 cents an hour.
MLA: “Inflation from 1933 to 1944: $100 is worth $135 today.” InflationCalculator.com, U.S. Bureau of Labor Statistics CPI-U data, https://inflationcalculator.com/inflation/1933-to-1944/
APA: InflationCalculator.com. Inflation from 1933 to 1944. Based on U.S. Bureau of Labor Statistics CPI-U data. Retrieved from https://inflationcalculator.com/inflation/1933-to-1944/