$100 in 1940 is worth $201 in 1957,
because prices increased 100.7% over that period, an average of
4.18% a year.
$100 in 1940 has
the same buying power as
$201
in 1957
Detailed inflation statistics
Cumulative price change
100.7%
Average inflation rate
4.18% per year
Converted amount ($100 base)
$201
Price difference ($100 base)
$101
CPI in 1940
14
CPI in 1957
28.1
Inflation in 1940
0.72%
Inflation in 1957
3.31%
$100 in 1940 → 1957
$201
$100 in 1957 → 1940
$49.82
What happened to prices between 1940 and 1957
Between 1940 and 1957, the Consumer Price Index went from 14 to 28.1.
Cumulatively, prices increased 100.7%, which works out to an average of
4.18% per year. Put differently, a dollar in 1940 bought what
$0.50 buys in 1957: the 1940 dollar
lost 50.2% of its purchasing power over
these 17 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 1957 at the same ratio, 2.01: $1,000 becomes
$2,007, and $10,000 becomes $20,071.
Amount in 1940
Value in 1957
$1.00
$2.01
$5.00
$10.04
$10.00
$20.07
$20.00
$40.14
$50.00
$100
$100
$201
$500
$1,004
$1,000
$2,007
$5,000
$10,036
$10,000
$20,071
$100,000
$200,714
$1,000,000
$2,007,143
Inflation by spending category, 1940–1957
Between 1940 and 1957, food rose the most, up 140.8%, while medical care rose the least, up 89.4%, against 100.7% for all items. The headline number is an average; here is what $100 of 1940
spending costs in 1957, by category:
Category
Avg. yearly inflation
$100 in 1940 →
All items (CPI-U)
4.18%
$201
Food
5.31%
$241
Apparel
4.29%
$204
Transportation
4.01%
$195
Medical care
3.83%
$189
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 1957
Prices climbed fastest in the 1940s, averaging 5.58% a year, and slowest in the 1950s (2.22% a year). Each step below chains into the full 1940–1957 change:
Years
Avg. yearly inflation
Price change
$100 from 1940, at end
1940–1950
5.58%
72.1%
$172
1950–1957
2.22%
16.6%
$201
Year by year: CPI and the value of $100 from 1940
$100 from 1940 had already become $172 by
1948, on its way to $201 in 1957; 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 1957, prices rose 3.3% and $100 from 1940 had the buying
power of $201; the year's average CPI of 28.1 is the level
behind every 1957 figure on this page.
Consumer prices rose 3.3% in 1957, up from 1956’s 1.5% and
the sharpest increase since the Korean War price surge of 1951. The jump
fed a growing debate among economists over “cost-push” inflation, prices
climbing from rising wages and material costs rather than excess demand,
a debate that would recur for the next quarter century. The Federal
Reserve tightened policy to fight it, and by August the tighter money
combined with falling business investment to tip the economy into a
recession, according to the National Bureau of Economic Research’s
dating. The Cold War took a technological turn that October, when the
Soviet Union launched Sputnik, the first artificial satellite, on the
4th, stunning the American public and setting off both the Space Race and
a surge in federal science and defense spending the following year. Civil
rights reached a crisis that September in Little Rock, Arkansas: after
Governor Orval Faubus used the National Guard to block nine Black
students from Central High School, Eisenhower federalized the Guard and
sent the 101st Airborne Division to enforce the Supreme Court’s
desegregation order. Consumer prices finished 1957 183.8% above their
1913 level. First-class postage held at 3 cents, and the
minimum wage stood at $1.00 an hour.
MLA: “Inflation from 1940 to 1957: $100 is worth $201 today.” InflationCalculator.com, U.S. Bureau of Labor Statistics CPI-U data, https://inflationcalculator.com/inflation/1940-to-1957/
APA: InflationCalculator.com. Inflation from 1940 to 1957. Based on U.S. Bureau of Labor Statistics CPI-U data. Retrieved from https://inflationcalculator.com/inflation/1940-to-1957/