$100 in 1940 is worth $973 in 1991,
because prices increased 872.9% over that period, an average of
4.56% a year.
$100 in 1940 has
the same buying power as
$973
in 1991
Detailed inflation statistics
Cumulative price change
872.9%
Average inflation rate
4.56% per year
Converted amount ($100 base)
$973
Price difference ($100 base)
$873
CPI in 1940
14
CPI in 1991
136.2
Inflation in 1940
0.72%
Inflation in 1991
4.21%
$100 in 1940 → 1991
$973
$100 in 1991 → 1940
$10.28
What happened to prices between 1940 and 1991
Between 1940 and 1991, the Consumer Price Index went from 14 to 136.2.
Cumulatively, prices increased 872.9%, which works out to an average of
4.56% per year. Put differently, a dollar in 1940 bought what
$0.10 buys in 1991: the 1940 dollar
lost 89.7% of its purchasing power over
these 51 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 1991 at the same ratio, 9.73: $1,000 becomes
$9,729, and $10,000 becomes $97,286.
Amount in 1940
Value in 1991
$1.00
$9.73
$5.00
$48.64
$10.00
$97.29
$20.00
$195
$50.00
$486
$100
$973
$500
$4,864
$1,000
$9,729
$5,000
$48,643
$10,000
$97,286
$100,000
$972,857
$1,000,000
$9,728,571
Inflation by spending category, 1940–1991
Between 1940 and 1991, medical care rose the most, up 1601.9%, while apparel rose the least, up 490.4%, against 872.9% for all items. The headline number is an average; here is what $100 of 1940
spending costs in 1991, by category:
Category
Avg. yearly inflation
$100 in 1940 →
All items (CPI-U)
4.56%
$973
Medical care
5.71%
$1,702
Food
4.88%
$1,136
Transportation
4.34%
$872
Apparel
3.54%
$590
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 1991
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 1940–1991 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
1980–1990
4.72%
58.6%
$934
1990–1991
4.21%
4.2%
$973
Year by year: CPI and the value of $100 from 1940
$100 from 1940 had already become $231 by
1966, on its way to $973 in 1991; 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: 1991
In 1991, prices rose 4.2% and $100 from 1940 had the buying
power of $973; the year's average CPI of 136.2 is the level
behind every 1991 figure on this page.
1991 opened in recession and closed in a slow, uneven recovery. The median household earned
about $30,100 for the year, gas averaged $1.14 a gallon, and a new home cost roughly $120,000.
Inflation ran at 4.2% for the year, down from 1990’s oil-driven spike, as the Gulf War ended in
February and crude oil retreated from its autumn highs. The recession itself, dated by the
National Bureau of Economic Research from July 1990 to March 1991, was technically over by
spring, but hiring stayed weak well into 1992, the stretch economists came to call the jobless
recovery. The Federal Reserve kept cutting interest rates through the year to support growth,
reversing the tightening campaign it had run through the late 1980s. In April the federal
minimum wage rose to $4.25 an hour, the second step of an increase from the $3.35 rate that had
held since 1981. The Postal Service had already raised the cost of a first-class stamp to 29
cents that February. It was the first full year of the decade without an oil shock driving
prices, even if the job market took longer to follow.
MLA: “Inflation from 1940 to 1991: $100 is worth $973 today.” InflationCalculator.com, U.S. Bureau of Labor Statistics CPI-U data, https://inflationcalculator.com/inflation/1940-to-1991/
APA: InflationCalculator.com. Inflation from 1940 to 1991. Based on U.S. Bureau of Labor Statistics CPI-U data. Retrieved from https://inflationcalculator.com/inflation/1940-to-1991/