$100 in 1938 is worth $247 in 1968,
because prices increased 146.8% over that period, an average of
3.06% a year.
$100 in 1938 has
the same buying power as
$247
in 1968
Detailed inflation statistics
Cumulative price change
146.8%
Average inflation rate
3.06% per year
Converted amount ($100 base)
$247
Price difference ($100 base)
$147
CPI in 1938
14.1
CPI in 1968
34.8
Inflation in 1938
-2.08%
Inflation in 1968
4.19%
$100 in 1938 → 1968
$247
$100 in 1968 → 1938
$40.52
What happened to prices between 1938 and 1968
Between 1938 and 1968, the Consumer Price Index went from 14.1 to 34.8.
Cumulatively, prices increased 146.8%, which works out to an average of
3.06% per year. Put differently, a dollar in 1938 bought what
$0.41 buys in 1968: the 1938 dollar
lost 59.5% of its purchasing power over
these 30 years.
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.
Every 1938 amount converts to 1968 at the same ratio, 2.47: $1,000 becomes
$2,468, and $10,000 becomes $24,681.
Amount in 1938
Value in 1968
$1.00
$2.47
$5.00
$12.34
$10.00
$24.68
$20.00
$49.36
$50.00
$123
$100
$247
$500
$1,234
$1,000
$2,468
$5,000
$12,340
$10,000
$24,681
$100,000
$246,809
$1,000,000
$2,468,085
Inflation by spending category, 1938–1968
Between 1938 and 1968, food rose the most, up 191.7%, while transportation rose the least, up 134.9%, against 146.8% for all items. The headline number is an average; here is what $100 of 1938
spending costs in 1968, by category:
Category
Avg. yearly inflation
$100 in 1938 →
All items (CPI-U)
3.06%
$247
Food
3.63%
$292
Medical care
3.62%
$290
Apparel
3.03%
$245
Transportation
2.89%
$235
Not shown because the BLS began these indexes after 1938: core (all items less food & energy) (1957–), energy (1957–), housing (1967–), recreation (1993–), education & communication (1993–).
Decade by decade: 1938 to 1968
Prices climbed fastest in the 1940s, averaging 5.58% a year, and fell in the 1930s (0.4% a year). Each step below chains into the full 1938–1968 change:
Years
Avg. yearly inflation
Price change
$100 from 1938, at end
1938–1940
-0.36%
-0.7%
$99.29
1940–1950
5.58%
72.1%
$171
1950–1960
2.08%
22.8%
$210
1960–1968
2.04%
17.6%
$247
Year by year: CPI and the value of $100 from 1938
$100 from 1938 had already become $189 by
1953, on its way to $247 in 1968; 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 1.4% in 1939, the deepest deflation of the period.
In 1968, prices rose 4.2% and $100 from 1938 had the buying
power of $247; the year's average CPI of 34.8 is the level
behind every 1968 figure on this page.
Consumer prices rose 4.2% in 1968, up sharply from 1967’s
3.1% and the fastest pace in 17 years, as Vietnam War spending and a tight
labor market pushed inflation higher despite the Federal Reserve’s
earlier tightening. The year was marked by political violence: Martin
Luther King Jr. was assassinated on a motel balcony in Memphis on April
4, touching off rioting in more than 100 cities, and Robert F. Kennedy was
shot in Los Angeles on June 5, moments after winning California’s
Democratic presidential primary, and died the next day. Washington tried
to answer the inflation problem directly that June 28, when Congress
passed a 10% income tax surcharge, the Revenue and Expenditure Control
Act, temporarily raising taxes and cutting spending to cool an economy
overheated by war and Great Society outlays; prices kept accelerating
anyway. The cost of living rose in smaller, more visible ways too:
first-class postage climbed to 6 cents that January 7, and the minimum
wage rose to $1.60 an hour that February 1, the final step of the
increase Congress had set two years earlier. Consumer prices finished
1968 251.5% above their 1913 level.
MLA: “Inflation from 1938 to 1968: $100 is worth $247 today.” InflationCalculator.com, U.S. Bureau of Labor Statistics CPI-U data, https://inflationcalculator.com/inflation/1938-to-1968/
APA: InflationCalculator.com. Inflation from 1938 to 1968. Based on U.S. Bureau of Labor Statistics CPI-U data. Retrieved from https://inflationcalculator.com/inflation/1938-to-1968/