$100 in 1937 is worth $184 in 1952,
because prices increased 84.0% over that period, an average of
4.15% a year.
$100 in 1937 has
the same buying power as
$184
in 1952
Detailed inflation statistics
Cumulative price change
84.0%
Average inflation rate
4.15% per year
Converted amount ($100 base)
$184
Price difference ($100 base)
$84.03
CPI in 1937
14.4
CPI in 1952
26.5
Inflation in 1937
3.60%
Inflation in 1952
1.92%
$100 in 1937 → 1952
$184
$100 in 1952 → 1937
$54.34
What happened to prices between 1937 and 1952
Between 1937 and 1952, the Consumer Price Index went from 14.4 to 26.5.
Cumulatively, prices increased 84.0%, which works out to an average of
4.15% per year. Put differently, a dollar in 1937 bought what
$0.54 buys in 1952: the 1937 dollar
lost 45.7% of its purchasing power over
these 15 years.
Consumer prices rose 3.6% in 1937, the fastest pace since before the
Depression and the fourth straight year of gains, leaving prices 10.8% above
their 1933 trough though still 15.8% below the
1929 peak. The recovery did not last the year. The National
Bureau of Economic Research dates a new business cycle peak to that May, the
start of what became known as the Recession of 1937-38. Policy tightened on
two fronts at once: the Federal Reserve had doubled bank reserve
requirements over the preceding year to head off inflation it worried was
building, and the federal government pulled back its own spending even as
new Social Security payroll taxes began draining money from paychecks
months before the first benefit checks went out. Together they choked off a
recovery that had not yet reached its pre-Depression footing. Not every
milestone that year was economic. The Golden Gate Bridge opened to traffic
on May 27 after four years of construction, at the time the longest
suspension bridge span in the world, a rare bright spot in a year that would
end with the economy sliding backward again. First-class postage held at 3
cents.
Every 1937 amount converts to 1952 at the same ratio, 1.84: $1,000 becomes
$1,840, and $10,000 becomes $18,403.
Amount in 1937
Value in 1952
$1.00
$1.84
$5.00
$9.20
$10.00
$18.40
$20.00
$36.81
$50.00
$92.01
$100
$184
$500
$920
$1,000
$1,840
$5,000
$9,201
$10,000
$18,403
$100,000
$184,028
$1,000,000
$1,840,278
Inflation by spending category, 1937–1952
Between 1937 and 1952, food rose the most, up 119.1%, while medical care rose the least, up 62.1%, against 84.0% for all items. The headline number is an average; here is what $100 of 1937
spending costs in 1952, by category:
Category
Avg. yearly inflation
$100 in 1937 →
All items (CPI-U)
4.15%
$184
Food
5.37%
$219
Apparel
4.65%
$198
Transportation
3.89%
$177
Medical care
3.27%
$162
Not shown because the BLS began these indexes after 1937: core (all items less food & energy) (1957–), energy (1957–), housing (1967–), recreation (1993–), education & communication (1993–).
Decade by decade: 1937 to 1952
Prices climbed fastest in the 1940s, averaging 5.58% a year, and fell in the 1930s (0.9% a year). Each step below chains into the full 1937–1952 change:
Years
Avg. yearly inflation
Price change
$100 from 1937, at end
1937–1940
-0.93%
-2.8%
$97.22
1940–1950
5.58%
72.1%
$167
1950–1952
4.86%
10.0%
$184
Year by year: CPI and the value of $100 from 1937
$100 from 1937 had already become $122 by
1944, on its way to $184 in 1952; each row shows the CPI, that
year's inflation rate, and the running value.
Within the span, inflation peaked at 14.4% in 1947, and prices fell 2.1% in 1938, the deepest deflation of the period.
In 1952, prices rose 1.9% and $100 from 1937 had the buying
power of $184; the year's average CPI of 26.5 is the level
behind every 1952 figure on this page.
Consumer prices rose 1.9% in 1952, down sharply from 1951’s
7.9% as the price and wage controls imposed the year before held the cost
of living in check even with the Korean War still underway. Labor strife
tested those controls that spring: to head off a strike that could have
disrupted war production, President Truman ordered the government to
seize the steel industry that April, over the objections of steel
companies fighting the price the Office of Price Stabilization had set for
their product. The Supreme Court ruled the seizure unconstitutional in
Youngstown Sheet & Tube Co. v. Sawyer that June, a landmark limit on
presidential power, and steelworkers then struck for 53 days before a
settlement. Politics delivered the year’s biggest change that November:
Dwight Eisenhower defeated Adlai Stevenson, promising to “go to Korea” to
end the war and returning Republicans to the White House for the first
time since 1933. The Cold War’s technological edge sharpened that same
month, when the United States tested the first hydrogen bomb at Enewetak
Atoll on November 1, a device hundreds of times more powerful than the
atomic bombs used against Japan in 1945. Consumer prices finished 1952
167.7% above their 1913 level. First-class postage held at
3 cents, and the minimum wage stayed at 75 cents an hour.
MLA: “Inflation from 1937 to 1952: $100 is worth $184 today.” InflationCalculator.com, U.S. Bureau of Labor Statistics CPI-U data, https://inflationcalculator.com/inflation/1937-to-1952/
APA: InflationCalculator.com. Inflation from 1937 to 1952. Based on U.S. Bureau of Labor Statistics CPI-U data. Retrieved from https://inflationcalculator.com/inflation/1937-to-1952/