$100 in 1936 is worth $106 in 1941,
because prices increased 5.8% over that period, an average of
1.13% a year.
$100 in 1936 has
the same buying power as
$106
in 1941
Detailed inflation statistics
Cumulative price change
5.8%
Average inflation rate
1.13% per year
Converted amount ($100 base)
$106
Price difference ($100 base)
$5.76
CPI in 1936
13.9
CPI in 1941
14.7
Inflation in 1936
1.46%
Inflation in 1941
5.00%
$100 in 1936 → 1941
$106
$100 in 1941 → 1936
$94.56
What happened to prices between 1936 and 1941
Between 1936 and 1941, the Consumer Price Index went from 13.9 to 14.7.
Cumulatively, prices increased 5.8%, which works out to an average of
1.13% per year. Put differently, a dollar in 1936 bought what
$0.95 buys in 1941: the 1936 dollar
lost 5.4% of its purchasing power over
these 5 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 1941 at the same ratio, 1.06: $1,000 becomes
$1,058, and $10,000 becomes $10,576.
Amount in 1936
Value in 1941
$1.00
$1.06
$5.00
$5.29
$10.00
$10.58
$20.00
$21.15
$50.00
$52.88
$100
$106
$500
$529
$1,000
$1,058
$5,000
$5,288
$10,000
$10,576
$100,000
$105,755
$1,000,000
$1,057,554
Inflation by spending category, 1936–1941
Between 1936 and 1941, apparel rose the most, up 8.6%, while medical care rose the least, up 2.0%, against 5.8% for all items. The headline number is an average; here is what $100 of 1936
spending costs in 1941, by category:
Category
Avg. yearly inflation
$100 in 1936 →
All items (CPI-U)
1.13%
$106
Apparel
1.66%
$109
Food
0.78%
$104
Transportation
0.55%
$103
Medical care
0.39%
$102
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–).
Decade by decade: 1936 to 1941
Prices climbed fastest in the 1940s, averaging 5.00% a year, and slowest in the 1930s (0.18% a year). Each step below chains into the full 1936–1941 change:
Years
Avg. yearly inflation
Price change
$100 from 1936, at end
1936–1940
0.18%
0.7%
$101
1940–1941
5.00%
5.0%
$106
Year by year: CPI and the value of $100 from 1936
$100 from 1936 had already become $101 by
1938, on its way to $106 in 1941; each row shows the CPI, that
year's inflation rate, and the running value.
Within the span, inflation peaked at 5.0% in 1941, and prices fell 2.1% in 1938, the deepest deflation of the period.
In 1941, prices rose 5.0% and $100 from 1936 had the buying
power of $106; the year's average CPI of 14.7 is the level
behind every 1941 figure on this page.
Consumer prices rose 5.0% in 1941, up sharply from just 0.7% in
1940 and the fastest annual increase since 1920, as
rearmament and Lend-Lease production pushed demand well ahead of peacetime
supply even before the United States formally joined the war. Congress had
already tilted the country away from neutrality that March, passing the
Lend-Lease Act to arm Britain, and later the Soviet Union and other Allies,
without requiring immediate payment. That April, the government created the
Office of Price Administration to hold down the cost of civilian goods, the
start of a price-control system that would keep official inflation numbers
well below what wartime demand alone would have produced over the next four
years. Then, on December 7, Japan attacked the naval base at Pearl Harbor,
destroying much of the Pacific Fleet and killing more than 2,400 Americans.
Congress declared war on Japan the next day and on Germany and Italy three
days later, ending years of debate over whether the United States should
stay out of the conflict spreading across Europe and Asia. Consumer prices,
already up 48.5% from their 1913 level, would climb far
faster over the next two years as the economy converted fully to war
production. First-class postage held at 3 cents, and the minimum wage stayed
at 30 cents an hour.
MLA: “Inflation from 1936 to 1941: $100 is worth $106 today.” InflationCalculator.com, U.S. Bureau of Labor Statistics CPI-U data, https://inflationcalculator.com/inflation/1936-to-1941/
APA: InflationCalculator.com. Inflation from 1936 to 1941. Based on U.S. Bureau of Labor Statistics CPI-U data. Retrieved from https://inflationcalculator.com/inflation/1936-to-1941/