$100 in 1941 is worth $133 in 1946,
because prices increased 32.7% over that period, an average of
5.81% a year.
$100 in 1941 has
the same buying power as
$133
in 1946
Detailed inflation statistics
Cumulative price change
32.7%
Average inflation rate
5.81% per year
Converted amount ($100 base)
$133
Price difference ($100 base)
$32.65
CPI in 1941
14.7
CPI in 1946
19.5
Inflation in 1941
5.00%
Inflation in 1946
8.33%
$100 in 1941 → 1946
$133
$100 in 1946 → 1941
$75.38
What happened to prices between 1941 and 1946
Between 1941 and 1946, the Consumer Price Index went from 14.7 to 19.5.
Cumulatively, prices increased 32.7%, which works out to an average of
5.81% per year. Put differently, a dollar in 1941 bought what
$0.75 buys in 1946: the 1941 dollar
lost 24.6% of its purchasing power over
these 5 years.
Consumer prices rose 5.0% in 1941, up sharply from just 0.7% in
1940 and the fastest annual increase since 1920, as
rearmament and Lend-Lease production pushed demand well ahead of peacetime
supply even before the United States formally joined the war. Congress had
already tilted the country away from neutrality that March, passing the
Lend-Lease Act to arm Britain, and later the Soviet Union and other Allies,
without requiring immediate payment. That April, the government created the
Office of Price Administration to hold down the cost of civilian goods, the
start of a price-control system that would keep official inflation numbers
well below what wartime demand alone would have produced over the next four
years. Then, on December 7, Japan attacked the naval base at Pearl Harbor,
destroying much of the Pacific Fleet and killing more than 2,400 Americans.
Congress declared war on Japan the next day and on Germany and Italy three
days later, ending years of debate over whether the United States should
stay out of the conflict spreading across Europe and Asia. Consumer prices,
already up 48.5% from their 1913 level, would climb far
faster over the next two years as the economy converted fully to war
production. First-class postage held at 3 cents, and the minimum wage stayed
at 30 cents an hour.
Every 1941 amount converts to 1946 at the same ratio, 1.33: $1,000 becomes
$1,327, and $10,000 becomes $13,265.
Amount in 1941
Value in 1946
$1.00
$1.33
$5.00
$6.63
$10.00
$13.27
$20.00
$26.53
$50.00
$66.33
$100
$133
$500
$663
$1,000
$1,327
$5,000
$6,633
$10,000
$13,265
$100,000
$132,653
$1,000,000
$1,326,531
Inflation by spending category, 1941–1946
Between 1941 and 1946, food rose the most, up 51.1%, while transportation rose the least, up 13.6%, against 32.7% for all items. The headline number is an average; here is what $100 of 1941
spending costs in 1946, by category:
Category
Avg. yearly inflation
$100 in 1941 →
All items (CPI-U)
5.81%
$133
Food
8.61%
$151
Apparel
8.57%
$151
Medical care
3.75%
$120
Transportation
2.58%
$114
Not shown because the BLS began these indexes after 1941: core (all items less food & energy) (1957–), energy (1957–), housing (1967–), recreation (1993–), education & communication (1993–).
Year by year: CPI and the value of $100 from 1941
$100 from 1941 had already become $118 by
1943, on its way to $133 in 1946; each row shows the CPI, that
year's inflation rate, and the running value.
Within the span, inflation peaked at 10.9% in 1942, and the smallest rise was 1.7% in 1944.
In 1946, prices rose 8.3% and $100 from 1941 had the buying
power of $133; the year's average CPI of 19.5 is the level
behind every 1946 figure on this page.
Consumer prices rose 8.3% in 1946, up sharply from 1945’s
2.3% and the sharpest increase since 1942, as wartime price controls
finally came apart. Congress let the Office of Price Administration’s
authority lapse at the end of June, reinstated a weaker version soon after,
then wound the whole system down through the rest of the year, releasing
years of pent-up demand into the price level almost at once. Meat was the
clearest casualty of the fight over decontrol: farmers withheld livestock
rather than sell at capped prices, producing severe shortages that spring
and summer until ceilings on meat were lifted that October, after which
supplies reappeared almost overnight. Labor cashed in its own wartime
restraint the same year. An estimated 4.6 million workers walked out at
some point in 1946, hitting steel, coal, automakers, and the railroads in
the largest strike wave in U.S. history, as unions pushed for wage gains to
offset cost-of-living increases controls could no longer contain. Amid the
turmoil, Congress made a less visible but lasting change to economic
policy: the Employment Act of 1946, signed that February, committed the
federal government to promoting maximum employment and created the Council
of Economic Advisers. Consumer prices stood 97.0% above their
1913 level, nearly double where the index had started 33
years earlier. First-class postage held at 3 cents, and the minimum wage
stayed at 40 cents an hour.
MLA: “Inflation from 1941 to 1946: $100 is worth $133 today.” InflationCalculator.com, U.S. Bureau of Labor Statistics CPI-U data, https://inflationcalculator.com/inflation/1941-to-1946/
APA: InflationCalculator.com. Inflation from 1941 to 1946. Based on U.S. Bureau of Labor Statistics CPI-U data. Retrieved from https://inflationcalculator.com/inflation/1941-to-1946/