$100 in 1940 is worth $186 in 1951,
because prices increased 85.7% over that period, an average of
5.79% a year.
$100 in 1940 has
the same buying power as
$186
in 1951
Detailed inflation statistics
Cumulative price change
85.7%
Average inflation rate
5.79% per year
Converted amount ($100 base)
$186
Price difference ($100 base)
$85.71
CPI in 1940
14
CPI in 1951
26
Inflation in 1940
0.72%
Inflation in 1951
7.88%
$100 in 1940 → 1951
$186
$100 in 1951 → 1940
$53.85
What happened to prices between 1940 and 1951
Between 1940 and 1951, the Consumer Price Index went from 14 to 26.
Cumulatively, prices increased 85.7%, which works out to an average of
5.79% per year. Put differently, a dollar in 1940 bought what
$0.54 buys in 1951: the 1940 dollar
lost 46.2% of its purchasing power over
these 11 years.
Consumer prices rose 0.7% in 1940, snapping 1939’s decline
and marking the first increase since 1937. The gain was modest, and the CPI
still stood 18.1% below its 1929 peak, a reminder of how far
the recovery from the Depression’s trough had left to go even as defense
orders from Britain and France began reaching American factories. War was
already reshaping domestic policy well before it touched American soil.
Congress passed the Selective Training and Service Act that September, the
country’s first peacetime draft, requiring men aged 21 to 35 to register and
authorizing the induction of up to 900,000 men a year, more than a year
before Pearl Harbor. That November, Franklin Roosevelt won an unprecedented
third term, defeating Republican Wendell Willkie after campaigning on
keeping the United States out of the war then consuming Europe and Asia. The
promise would not hold much longer: within two years, wartime demand would
push consumer prices up faster than at any point since the aftermath of
World War I. First-class postage held at 3 cents, and the federal minimum
wage stayed at 30 cents an hour, the level set the previous October under
the Fair Labor Standards Act.
Every 1940 amount converts to 1951 at the same ratio, 1.86: $1,000 becomes
$1,857, and $10,000 becomes $18,571.
Amount in 1940
Value in 1951
$1.00
$1.86
$5.00
$9.29
$10.00
$18.57
$20.00
$37.14
$50.00
$92.86
$100
$186
$500
$929
$1,000
$1,857
$5,000
$9,286
$10,000
$18,571
$100,000
$185,714
$1,000,000
$1,857,143
Inflation by spending category, 1940–1951
Between 1940 and 1951, food rose the most, up 135.0%, while medical care rose the least, up 52.9%, against 85.7% for all items. The headline number is an average; here is what $100 of 1940
spending costs in 1951, by category:
Category
Avg. yearly inflation
$100 in 1940 →
All items (CPI-U)
5.79%
$186
Food
8.08%
$235
Apparel
6.57%
$201
Transportation
4.93%
$170
Medical care
3.93%
$153
Not shown because the BLS began these indexes after 1940: core (all items less food & energy) (1957–), energy (1957–), housing (1967–), recreation (1993–), education & communication (1993–).
Decade by decade: 1940 to 1951
Prices climbed fastest in the 1950s, averaging 7.88% a year, and slowest in the 1940s (5.58% a year). Each step below chains into the full 1940–1951 change:
Years
Avg. yearly inflation
Price change
$100 from 1940, at end
1940–1950
5.58%
72.1%
$172
1950–1951
7.88%
7.9%
$186
Year by year: CPI and the value of $100 from 1940
$100 from 1940 had already become $129 by
1945, on its way to $186 in 1951; 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 1.2% in 1949, the deepest deflation of the period.
In 1951, prices rose 7.9% and $100 from 1940 had the buying
power of $186; the year's average CPI of 26 is the level
behind every 1951 figure on this page.
Consumer prices rose 7.9% in 1951, up sharply from 1950’s
1.3% and the fastest increase since 1947, as Korean War buying and a
defense spending surge hit an economy still adjusting to peacetime. Much
of the jump came early in the year, before the government stepped in: the
Office of Price Stabilization imposed a general ceiling on prices January
26, and the Wage Stabilization Board froze wages soon after, the broadest
peacetime controls since the war began that June. The year’s more lasting
change came in monetary policy. On March 4, the Treasury and the Federal
Reserve signed the Accord, ending the Fed’s wartime obligation to hold
down interest rates on government bonds and freeing the central bank to
fight inflation on its own terms for the first time since 1942, a shift
that would shape Fed independence for decades. Congress raised taxes that
October to help pay for the war: the Revenue Act of 1951, signed October
20, lifted individual and corporate income taxes along with a range of
excise taxes, the third increase in taxes since fighting began in Korea.
Consumer prices finished 1951 162.6% above their 1913
level. First-class postage held at 3 cents, and the minimum wage stayed at
75 cents an hour.
MLA: “Inflation from 1940 to 1951: $100 is worth $186 today.” InflationCalculator.com, U.S. Bureau of Labor Statistics CPI-U data, https://inflationcalculator.com/inflation/1940-to-1951/
APA: InflationCalculator.com. Inflation from 1940 to 1951. Based on U.S. Bureau of Labor Statistics CPI-U data. Retrieved from https://inflationcalculator.com/inflation/1940-to-1951/