$100 in 1940 is worth $1,089 in 1995,
because prices increased 988.6% over that period, an average of
4.44% a year.
$100 in 1940 has
the same buying power as
$1,089
in 1995
Detailed inflation statistics
Cumulative price change
988.6%
Average inflation rate
4.44% per year
Converted amount ($100 base)
$1,089
Price difference ($100 base)
$989
CPI in 1940
14
CPI in 1995
152.4
Inflation in 1940
0.72%
Inflation in 1995
2.83%
$100 in 1940 → 1995
$1,089
$100 in 1995 → 1940
$9.19
What happened to prices between 1940 and 1995
Between 1940 and 1995, the Consumer Price Index went from 14 to 152.4.
Cumulatively, prices increased 988.6%, which works out to an average of
4.44% per year. Put differently, a dollar in 1940 bought what
$0.09 buys in 1995: the 1940 dollar
lost 90.8% of its purchasing power over
these 55 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 1995 at the same ratio, 10.89: $1,000 becomes
$10,886, and $10,000 becomes $108,857.
Amount in 1940
Value in 1995
$1.00
$10.89
$5.00
$54.43
$10.00
$109
$20.00
$218
$50.00
$544
$100
$1,089
$500
$5,443
$1,000
$10,886
$5,000
$54,429
$10,000
$108,857
$100,000
$1,088,571
$1,000,000
$10,885,714
Inflation by spending category, 1940–1995
Between 1940 and 1995, medical care rose the most, up 2020.2%, while apparel rose the least, up 505.5%, against 988.6% for all items. The headline number is an average; here is what $100 of 1940
spending costs in 1995, by category:
Category
Avg. yearly inflation
$100 in 1940 →
All items (CPI-U)
4.44%
$1,089
Medical care
5.71%
$2,120
Food
4.68%
$1,237
Transportation
4.24%
$980
Apparel
3.33%
$606
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 1995
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 1940–1995 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
1990–1995
3.12%
16.6%
$1,089
Year by year: CPI and the value of $100 from 1940
$100 from 1940 had already become $249 by
1968, on its way to $1,089 in 1995; 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: 1995
In 1995, prices rose 2.8% and $100 from 1940 had the buying
power of $1,089; the year's average CPI of 152.4 is the level
behind every 1995 figure on this page.
In 1995, gas averaged $1.15 a gallon, a new home cost roughly $133,900, and the median household
earned about $34,100. Inflation ran at 2.8% for the year, little changed from 1994, as the
Federal Reserve shifted from raising rates to cutting them. Having lifted its policy rate six
times the year before, the Fed judged by July that the economy had cooled enough on its own, and
trimmed rates instead, an outcome economists would later point to as a rare soft landing. The
year opened with a currency crisis: Mexico’s peso lost roughly half its value against the dollar
in a matter of weeks, and the U.S. Treasury and the IMF assembled a $50 billion rescue package,
controversial in Congress, to stabilize it and keep the crisis from spreading to other emerging
markets. Closer to home, a budget standoff between President Clinton and the Republican Congress
shut down federal agencies twice, first for five days in November and then for 21 days spanning
December into January 1996, the longest shutdown up to that point. The Postal Service raised the
cost of a first-class stamp to 32 cents in January. Low, steady inflation was about the only calm
part of 1995’s economic story.
MLA: “Inflation from 1940 to 1995: $100 is worth $1,089 today.” InflationCalculator.com, U.S. Bureau of Labor Statistics CPI-U data, https://inflationcalculator.com/inflation/1940-to-1995/
APA: InflationCalculator.com. Inflation from 1940 to 1995. Based on U.S. Bureau of Labor Statistics CPI-U data. Retrieved from https://inflationcalculator.com/inflation/1940-to-1995/