$100 in 1940 is worth $1,440 in 2006,
because prices increased 1340.0% over that period, an average of
4.12% a year.
$100 in 1940 has
the same buying power as
$1,440
in 2006
Detailed inflation statistics
Cumulative price change
1340.0%
Average inflation rate
4.12% per year
Converted amount ($100 base)
$1,440
Price difference ($100 base)
$1,340
CPI in 1940
14
CPI in 2006
201.6
Inflation in 1940
0.72%
Inflation in 2006
3.23%
$100 in 1940 → 2006
$1,440
$100 in 2006 → 1940
$6.94
What happened to prices between 1940 and 2006
Between 1940 and 2006, the Consumer Price Index went from 14 to 201.6.
Cumulatively, prices increased 1340.0%, which works out to an average of
4.12% per year. Put differently, a dollar in 1940 bought what
$0.07 buys in 2006: the 1940 dollar
lost 93.1% of its purchasing power over
these 66 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 2006 at the same ratio, 14.40: $1,000 becomes
$14,400, and $10,000 becomes $144,000.
Amount in 1940
Value in 2006
$1.00
$14.40
$5.00
$72.00
$10.00
$144
$20.00
$288
$50.00
$720
$100
$1,440
$500
$7,200
$1,000
$14,400
$5,000
$72,000
$10,000
$144,000
$100,000
$1,440,000
$1,000,000
$14,400,000
Inflation by spending category, 1940–2006
Between 1940 and 2006, medical care rose the most, up 3132.7%, while apparel rose the least, up 448.2%, against 1340.0% for all items. The headline number is an average; here is what $100 of 1940
spending costs in 2006, by category:
Category
Avg. yearly inflation
$100 in 1940 →
All items (CPI-U)
4.12%
$1,440
Medical care
5.41%
$3,233
Food
4.32%
$1,627
Transportation
3.93%
$1,274
Apparel
2.61%
$548
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 2006
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 1940–2006 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
1990–2000
2.80%
31.8%
$1,230
2000–2006
2.66%
17.1%
$1,440
Year by year: CPI and the value of $100 from 1940
$100 from 1940 had already become $384 by
1975, on its way to $1,440 in 2006; 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 5 years; the calculator above covers any pair of years.
The destination year: 2006
In 2006, prices rose 3.2% and $100 from 1940 had the buying
power of $1,440; the year's average CPI of 201.6 is the level
behind every 2006 figure on this page.
Inflation was 3.2% in 2006 and gasoline averaged $2.59 a gallon, up 29 cents from 2005. The
median household earned about $48,200 and the median new home cost $246,500, a gain of about
2% after a 13% jump in 2004 and 9% in 2005. National home prices, by the S&P/Case-Shiller
index, peaked in mid-2006. Ben Bernanke replaced Alan Greenspan as Federal Reserve chair on
February 1, and on June 29 the Fed raised its policy rate to 5.25%, the last of 17 straight
quarter-point increases. It held there for over a year. A first-class stamp rose to 39 cents in
January, and the federal minimum wage was $5.15 for the ninth full year in a row.
MLA: “Inflation from 1940 to 2006: $100 is worth $1,440 today.” InflationCalculator.com, U.S. Bureau of Labor Statistics CPI-U data, https://inflationcalculator.com/inflation/1940-to-2006/
APA: InflationCalculator.com. Inflation from 1940 to 2006. Based on U.S. Bureau of Labor Statistics CPI-U data. Retrieved from https://inflationcalculator.com/inflation/1940-to-2006/