$100 in 1936 is worth $101 in 1938,
because prices increased 1.4% over that period, an average of
0.72% a year.
$100 in 1936 has
the same buying power as
$101
in 1938
Detailed inflation statistics
Cumulative price change
1.4%
Average inflation rate
0.72% per year
Converted amount ($100 base)
$101
Price difference ($100 base)
$1.44
CPI in 1936
13.9
CPI in 1938
14.1
Inflation in 1936
1.46%
Inflation in 1938
-2.08%
$100 in 1936 → 1938
$101
$100 in 1938 → 1936
$98.58
What happened to prices between 1936 and 1938
Between 1936 and 1938, the Consumer Price Index went from 13.9 to 14.1.
Cumulatively, prices increased 1.4%, which works out to an average of
0.72% per year. Put differently, a dollar in 1936 bought what
$0.99 buys in 1938: the 1936 dollar
lost 1.4% of its purchasing power over
these 2 years.
Consumer prices rose 1.5% in 1936, a third straight annual increase and part
of a slow, steady climb back from the 1933 trough, though
prices and the broader economy still had not fully recovered to their
pre-Depression levels. Voters delivered their verdict on that recovery in
November, reelecting Franklin D. Roosevelt over Republican Alf Landon in one
of the most lopsided elections in U.S. history: Roosevelt carried 46 of 48
states and won the Electoral College 523 to 8, a broad public endorsement of
the New Deal. Public works kept advancing that year, too. Hoover Dam, one of
the era’s signature projects, had been dedicated in September 1935, but its
first generators did not begin sending electricity over transmission lines
to Los Angeles until October 1936, a milestone that showed how long even a
celebrated project took to reach full operation. Consumer prices ended the
year 40.4% above their 1913 level, still 18.7% below the
1929 peak, a gap that would keep narrowing until a sharp new recession
interrupted the recovery the following year. First-class postage held at 3
cents.
Every 1936 amount converts to 1938 at the same ratio, 1.01: $1,000 becomes
$1,014, and $10,000 becomes $10,144.
Amount in 1936
Value in 1938
$1.00
$1.01
$5.00
$5.07
$10.00
$10.14
$20.00
$20.29
$50.00
$50.72
$100
$101
$500
$507
$1,000
$1,014
$5,000
$5,072
$10,000
$10,144
$100,000
$101,439
$1,000,000
$1,014,388
Inflation by spending category, 1936–1938
Between 1936 and 1938, apparel rose the most, up 4.3%, while food fell 4.0%, against 1.4% for all items. The headline number is an average; here is what $100 of 1936
spending costs in 1938, by category:
Category
Avg. yearly inflation
$100 in 1936 →
All items (CPI-U)
0.72%
$101
Apparel
2.12%
$104
Transportation
1.04%
$102
Medical care
0.49%
$101
Food
-2.00%
$96.03
Not shown because the BLS began these indexes after 1936: core (all items less food & energy) (1957–), energy (1957–), housing (1967–), recreation (1993–), education & communication (1993–).
Year by year: CPI and the value of $100 from 1936
$100 from 1936 had already become $104 by
1937, on its way to $101 in 1938; 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 1938, prices fell 2.1% and $100 from 1936 had the buying
power of $101; the year's average CPI of 14.1 is the level
behind every 1938 figure on this page.
Consumer prices fell 2.1% in 1938, reversing most of 1937’s
gain and interrupting four straight years of recovery from the Depression’s
trough. The National Bureau of Economic Research dates the bottom of the
downturn, which had begun that May, to June 1938, a sharp 13-month
contraction that briefly pushed unemployment back up near 19%. Even in a
year the economy was shrinking again, Congress passed one of the New Deal’s
most lasting reforms. The Fair Labor Standards Act, signed June 25 and
effective that October, established the first federal minimum wage, 25
cents an hour, capped the standard workweek at 44 hours with time-and-a-half
overtime beyond it, and restricted the employment of children in most
industries. The wage floor and hours limits applied only to workers engaged
in interstate commerce at first, but they set a precedent that would expand
in the decades that followed. Consumer prices stood 42.4% above their
1913 level and 17.5% below their 1929 peak, evidence of how
far the recovery still had to go even eight years after the Depression
began. First-class postage held at 3 cents.
MLA: “Inflation from 1936 to 1938: $100 is worth $101 today.” InflationCalculator.com, U.S. Bureau of Labor Statistics CPI-U data, https://inflationcalculator.com/inflation/1936-to-1938/
APA: InflationCalculator.com. Inflation from 1936 to 1938. Based on U.S. Bureau of Labor Statistics CPI-U data. Retrieved from https://inflationcalculator.com/inflation/1936-to-1938/