$100 in 1940 is worth $214 in 1961,
because prices increased 113.6% over that period, an average of
3.68% a year.
$100 in 1940 has
the same buying power as
$214
in 1961
Detailed inflation statistics
Cumulative price change
113.6%
Average inflation rate
3.68% per year
Converted amount ($100 base)
$214
Price difference ($100 base)
$114
CPI in 1940
14
CPI in 1961
29.9
Inflation in 1940
0.72%
Inflation in 1961
1.01%
$100 in 1940 → 1961
$214
$100 in 1961 → 1940
$46.82
What happened to prices between 1940 and 1961
Between 1940 and 1961, the Consumer Price Index went from 14 to 29.9.
Cumulatively, prices increased 113.6%, which works out to an average of
3.68% per year. Put differently, a dollar in 1940 bought what
$0.47 buys in 1961: the 1940 dollar
lost 53.2% of its purchasing power over
these 21 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 1961 at the same ratio, 2.14: $1,000 becomes
$2,136, and $10,000 becomes $21,357.
Amount in 1940
Value in 1961
$1.00
$2.14
$5.00
$10.68
$10.00
$21.36
$20.00
$42.71
$50.00
$107
$100
$214
$500
$1,068
$1,000
$2,136
$5,000
$10,679
$10,000
$21,357
$100,000
$213,571
$1,000,000
$2,135,714
Inflation by spending category, 1940–1961
Between 1940 and 1961, food rose the most, up 153.3%, while apparel rose the least, up 111.5%, against 113.6% for all items. The headline number is an average; here is what $100 of 1940
spending costs in 1961, by category:
Category
Avg. yearly inflation
$100 in 1940 →
All items (CPI-U)
3.68%
$214
Food
4.53%
$253
Medical care
3.83%
$220
Transportation
3.64%
$212
Apparel
3.63%
$211
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 1961
Prices climbed fastest in the 1940s, averaging 5.58% a year, and slowest in the 1960s (1.01% a year). Each step below chains into the full 1940–1961 change:
Years
Avg. yearly inflation
Price change
$100 from 1940, at end
1940–1950
5.58%
72.1%
$172
1950–1960
2.08%
22.8%
$211
1960–1961
1.01%
1.0%
$214
Year by year: CPI and the value of $100 from 1940
$100 from 1940 had already become $172 by
1950, on its way to $214 in 1961; 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 1961, prices rose 1.0% and $100 from 1940 had the buying
power of $214; the year's average CPI of 29.9 is the level
behind every 1961 figure on this page.
Consumer prices rose 1.0% in 1961, down from 1960’s 1.7% as
the economy climbed out of recession, a recovery the National Bureau of
Economic Research dates to that February. Politically, the year opened
with a changing of the guard: outgoing president Dwight Eisenhower’s
farewell address on January 17 warned of a growing “military-industrial
complex,” and three days later John F. Kennedy was sworn in, urging
Americans to “ask not what your country can do for you.” The new
administration’s first major foreign-policy test came quickly and badly:
a CIA-organized force of Cuban exiles landed at the Bay of Pigs on April
17 aiming to topple Fidel Castro, and without the U.S. air support Kennedy
withheld, the invasion collapsed within three days. Cold War tensions
hardened further that August, when East German forces sealed the border
between East and West Berlin overnight, building what would become the
Berlin Wall and stopping the flow of refugees to the West. Domestically,
the wage floor moved for the first time in five years: the Fair Labor
Standards Amendments of 1961, effective that September, raised the
minimum wage to $1.15 an hour and extended coverage to roughly 3.6 million
additional workers. Consumer prices finished 1961 202.0% above their
1913 level. First-class postage held at 4 cents.
MLA: “Inflation from 1940 to 1961: $100 is worth $214 today.” InflationCalculator.com, U.S. Bureau of Labor Statistics CPI-U data, https://inflationcalculator.com/inflation/1940-to-1961/
APA: InflationCalculator.com. Inflation from 1940 to 1961. Based on U.S. Bureau of Labor Statistics CPI-U data. Retrieved from https://inflationcalculator.com/inflation/1940-to-1961/