$100 in 1940 is worth $711 in 1983,
because prices increased 611.4% over that period, an average of
4.67% a year.
$100 in 1940 has
the same buying power as
$711
in 1983
Detailed inflation statistics
Cumulative price change
611.4%
Average inflation rate
4.67% per year
Converted amount ($100 base)
$711
Price difference ($100 base)
$611
CPI in 1940
14
CPI in 1983
99.6
Inflation in 1940
0.72%
Inflation in 1983
3.21%
$100 in 1940 → 1983
$711
$100 in 1983 → 1940
$14.06
What happened to prices between 1940 and 1983
Between 1940 and 1983, the Consumer Price Index went from 14 to 99.6.
Cumulatively, prices increased 611.4%, which works out to an average of
4.67% per year. Put differently, a dollar in 1940 bought what
$0.14 buys in 1983: the 1940 dollar
lost 85.9% of its purchasing power over
these 43 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 1983 at the same ratio, 7.11: $1,000 becomes
$7,114, and $10,000 becomes $71,143.
Amount in 1940
Value in 1983
$1.00
$7.11
$5.00
$35.57
$10.00
$71.14
$20.00
$142
$50.00
$356
$100
$711
$500
$3,557
$1,000
$7,114
$5,000
$35,571
$10,000
$71,143
$100,000
$711,429
$1,000,000
$7,114,286
Inflation by spending category, 1940–1983
Between 1940 and 1983, medical care rose the most, up 867.3%, while apparel rose the least, up 359.6%, against 611.4% for all items. The headline number is an average; here is what $100 of 1940
spending costs in 1983, by category:
Category
Avg. yearly inflation
$100 in 1940 →
All items (CPI-U)
4.67%
$711
Medical care
5.42%
$967
Food
5.04%
$828
Transportation
4.63%
$699
Apparel
3.61%
$460
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 1983
Prices climbed fastest in the 1970s, averaging 7.82% a year, and slowest in the 1950s (2.08% a year). Each step below chains into the full 1940–1983 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
1960–1970
2.74%
31.1%
$277
1970–1980
7.82%
112.4%
$589
1980–1983
6.52%
20.9%
$711
Year by year: CPI and the value of $100 from 1940
$100 from 1940 had already become $216 by
1962, on its way to $711 in 1983; 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.
Long periods are sampled every 2 years; the calculator above covers any pair of years.
The destination year: 1983
In 1983, prices rose 3.2% and $100 from 1940 had the buying
power of $711; the year's average CPI of 99.6 is the level
behind every 1983 figure on this page.
1983 confirmed that the Volcker disinflation was not a one-year fluke.
Consumer prices rose 3.2% for the year, nearly identical to 1982’s pace and a
fraction of the double-digit rates of 1980 and 1981. With inflation tamed and
interest rates coming down, the economy roared back from the 1981-82
recession: real GDP grew 4.6%, the strongest calendar-year growth since the
1950s, and unemployment fell from its 10.8% peak to 8.3% by December. Housing
and auto sales, both starved of credit during the recession, led the
rebound. In April, Congress and President Reagan enacted the Social Security
Amendments of 1983, a bipartisan rescue of a system projected to run out of
money within months. The law gradually raised the full retirement age from
65 to 67, began taxing benefits for higher-income retirees, and delayed that
year’s cost-of-living adjustment by six months. For a program whose benefits
had been indexed to the CPI since 1975, the amendments were the first major
sign that inflation-proofing Social Security carried a cost Congress could
not simply legislate away. By year’s end, gas averaged $1.16 a gallon and
mailing a letter still cost 20 cents, prices that had barely moved since
1981, a sharp break from the constant increases of the previous decade.
MLA: “Inflation from 1940 to 1983: $100 is worth $711 today.” InflationCalculator.com, U.S. Bureau of Labor Statistics CPI-U data, https://inflationcalculator.com/inflation/1940-to-1983/
APA: InflationCalculator.com. Inflation from 1940 to 1983. Based on U.S. Bureau of Labor Statistics CPI-U data. Retrieved from https://inflationcalculator.com/inflation/1940-to-1983/