$100 in 1938 is worth $315 in 1973,
because prices increased 214.9% over that period, an average of
3.33% a year.
$100 in 1938 has
the same buying power as
$315
in 1973
Detailed inflation statistics
Cumulative price change
214.9%
Average inflation rate
3.33% per year
Converted amount ($100 base)
$315
Price difference ($100 base)
$215
CPI in 1938
14.1
CPI in 1973
44.4
Inflation in 1938
-2.08%
Inflation in 1973
6.22%
$100 in 1938 → 1973
$315
$100 in 1973 → 1938
$31.76
What happened to prices between 1938 and 1973
Between 1938 and 1973, the Consumer Price Index went from 14.1 to 44.4.
Cumulatively, prices increased 214.9%, which works out to an average of
3.33% per year. Put differently, a dollar in 1938 bought what
$0.32 buys in 1973: the 1938 dollar
lost 68.2% of its purchasing power over
these 35 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 1973 at the same ratio, 3.15: $1,000 becomes
$3,149, and $10,000 becomes $31,489.
Amount in 1938
Value in 1973
$1.00
$3.15
$5.00
$15.74
$10.00
$31.49
$20.00
$62.98
$50.00
$157
$100
$315
$500
$1,574
$1,000
$3,149
$5,000
$15,745
$10,000
$31,489
$100,000
$314,894
$1,000,000
$3,148,936
Inflation by spending category, 1938–1973
Between 1938 and 1973, food rose the most, up 298.3%, while transportation rose the least, up 182.2%, against 214.9% for all items. The headline number is an average; here is what $100 of 1938
spending costs in 1973, by category:
Category
Avg. yearly inflation
$100 in 1938 →
All items (CPI-U)
3.33%
$315
Food
4.03%
$398
Medical care
3.86%
$377
Apparel
3.14%
$295
Transportation
3.01%
$282
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 1973
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 1938–1973 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
1960–1970
2.74%
31.1%
$275
1970–1973
4.60%
14.4%
$315
Year by year: CPI and the value of $100 from 1938
$100 from 1938 had already become $193 by
1956, on its way to $315 in 1973; 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.
Long periods are sampled every 2 years; the calculator above covers any pair of years.
The destination year: 1973
In 1973, prices rose 6.2% and $100 from 1938 had the buying
power of $315; the year's average CPI of 44.4 is the level
behind every 1973 figure on this page.
Consumer prices rose 6.2% in 1973, nearly double 1972’s 3.2%,
as Nixon’s wage and price controls were phased out through the year and
pressure the controls had been holding back broke loose. The bigger shock
arrived that October, when Arab oil-producing states embargoed exports to the
United States and other supporters of Israel in the Yom Kippur War. Crude
oil, which had traded around $3 a barrel, approached $12 by early 1974, and
gas lines became a fixture outside filling stations nationwide. Earlier in
the year, the Paris Peace Accords, signed that January 27, ended direct
American combat in Vietnam and set a 60-day deadline for withdrawing
remaining U.S. troops, even as fighting between North and South Vietnam went
on. Financial markets read the year correctly as a turning point: the Dow
Jones Industrial Average peaked at 1,051.70 on January 11, a level it would
not reach again until 1980, before the oil shock and rising interest rates
dragged it into a two-year bear market. A median household earned $10,512 in
1973, a new home sold for a median $32,500, and gas averaged 38.5 cents a
gallon, still under half of what the embargo’s effects would bring the
following year. Consumer prices stood 348.5% above their
1913 level by year’s end, with the decade’s worst inflation
still ahead.
MLA: “Inflation from 1938 to 1973: $100 is worth $315 today.” InflationCalculator.com, U.S. Bureau of Labor Statistics CPI-U data, https://inflationcalculator.com/inflation/1938-to-1973/
APA: InflationCalculator.com. Inflation from 1938 to 1973. Based on U.S. Bureau of Labor Statistics CPI-U data. Retrieved from https://inflationcalculator.com/inflation/1938-to-1973/