$100 in 1934 is worth $129 in 1943,
because prices increased 29.1% over that period, an average of
2.88% a year.
$100 in 1934 has
the same buying power as
$129
in 1943
Detailed inflation statistics
Cumulative price change
29.1%
Average inflation rate
2.88% per year
Converted amount ($100 base)
$129
Price difference ($100 base)
$29.10
CPI in 1934
13.4
CPI in 1943
17.3
Inflation in 1934
3.08%
Inflation in 1943
6.13%
$100 in 1934 → 1943
$129
$100 in 1943 → 1934
$77.46
What happened to prices between 1934 and 1943
Between 1934 and 1943, the Consumer Price Index went from 13.4 to 17.3.
Cumulatively, prices increased 29.1%, which works out to an average of
2.88% per year. Put differently, a dollar in 1934 bought what
$0.77 buys in 1943: the 1934 dollar
lost 22.5% of its purchasing power over
these 9 years.
Consumer prices rose 3.1% in 1934, the first annual increase since 1926;
every year from 1927 through 1933 had been flat or falling,
so the turn marked a real break after eight years without a single gain.
Currency policy did some of the work. The Gold Reserve Act, signed January
30, formally devalued the dollar by raising the official price of gold from
$20.67 to $35 an ounce, part of the administration’s deliberate effort to
reflate prices after four straight years of deflation. Financial regulation
tightened at the same time: the Securities Exchange Act of June 6 created
the Securities and Exchange Commission to police stock exchanges and enforce
disclosure rules, a direct response to the speculation blamed for the 1929
crash. The recovery was fragile and unevenly felt, especially on the Great
Plains, where drought had turned overplowed farmland to dust. Over May 9-11,
high winds lifted an estimated 350 million tons of topsoil into the air,
darkening skies as far away as Washington and New York and giving city
readers who had never seen a wheat field a first glimpse of the disaster
building in Kansas, Oklahoma, and Texas. Consumer prices stood 35.4% above
their 1913 level, still well below the 1929 peak but rising
for the first time since the Depression began. First-class postage held at
3 cents.
Every 1934 amount converts to 1943 at the same ratio, 1.29: $1,000 becomes
$1,291, and $10,000 becomes $12,910.
Amount in 1934
Value in 1943
$1.00
$1.29
$5.00
$6.46
$10.00
$12.91
$20.00
$25.82
$50.00
$64.55
$100
$129
$500
$646
$1,000
$1,291
$5,000
$6,455
$10,000
$12,910
$100,000
$129,104
$1,000,000
$1,291,045
Inflation by spending category, 1934–1943
Between 1934 and 1943, food rose the most, up 47.4%, while apparel rose the least, up 35.0%, against 29.1% for all items. The headline number is an average; here is what $100 of 1934
spending costs in 1943, by category:
Category
Avg. yearly inflation
$100 in 1934 →
All items (CPI-U)
2.88%
$129
Food
4.41%
$147
Apparel
3.39%
$135
Not shown because the BLS began these indexes after 1934: core (all items less food & energy) (1957–), energy (1957–), housing (1967–), medical care (1935–), transportation (1935–), recreation (1993–), education & communication (1993–).
Decade by decade: 1934 to 1943
Prices climbed fastest in the 1940s, averaging 7.31% a year, and slowest in the 1930s (0.73% a year). Each step below chains into the full 1934–1943 change:
Years
Avg. yearly inflation
Price change
$100 from 1934, at end
1934–1940
0.73%
4.5%
$104
1940–1943
7.31%
23.6%
$129
Year by year: CPI and the value of $100 from 1934
$100 from 1934 had already become $105 by
1938, on its way to $129 in 1943; 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 1943, prices rose 6.1% and $100 from 1934 had the buying
power of $129; the year's average CPI of 17.3 is the level
behind every 1943 figure on this page.
Consumer prices rose 6.1% in 1943, a slower pace than 1942’s
surge but still well above anything the country had seen before the war.
The slowdown owed largely to the “Hold the Line” order, issued that April,
which froze most wages, prices, and rents at their current levels after the
previous year’s jump showed how far demand had outrun the existing
controls. Rationing grew more sophisticated alongside the freeze: starting
in February, a points system split scarce goods into red points for meat,
butter, and other fats and blue points for canned and processed foods,
letting households budget across categories instead of simply going without
once a flat quota ran dry. The government also changed how it collected the
taxes paying for all of it. The Current Tax Payment Act, signed June 9,
required employers to withhold federal income tax directly from paychecks
for the first time, smoothing the flow of wartime revenue and creating the
pay-as-you-go system still used today. Consumer prices stood 74.7% above
their 1913 level and 33.1% above 1933’s
Depression-era low. First-class postage held at 3 cents, and the minimum
wage stayed at 30 cents an hour.
MLA: “Inflation from 1934 to 1943: $100 is worth $129 today.” InflationCalculator.com, U.S. Bureau of Labor Statistics CPI-U data, https://inflationcalculator.com/inflation/1934-to-1943/
APA: InflationCalculator.com. Inflation from 1934 to 1943. Based on U.S. Bureau of Labor Statistics CPI-U data. Retrieved from https://inflationcalculator.com/inflation/1934-to-1943/