$100 in 1941 is worth $191 in 1957,
because prices increased 91.2% over that period, an average of
4.13% a year.
$100 in 1941 has
the same buying power as
$191
in 1957
Detailed inflation statistics
Cumulative price change
91.2%
Average inflation rate
4.13% per year
Converted amount ($100 base)
$191
Price difference ($100 base)
$91.16
CPI in 1941
14.7
CPI in 1957
28.1
Inflation in 1941
5.00%
Inflation in 1957
3.31%
$100 in 1941 → 1957
$191
$100 in 1957 → 1941
$52.31
What happened to prices between 1941 and 1957
Between 1941 and 1957, the Consumer Price Index went from 14.7 to 28.1.
Cumulatively, prices increased 91.2%, which works out to an average of
4.13% per year. Put differently, a dollar in 1941 bought what
$0.52 buys in 1957: the 1941 dollar
lost 47.7% of its purchasing power over
these 16 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 1957 at the same ratio, 1.91: $1,000 becomes
$1,912, and $10,000 becomes $19,116.
Amount in 1941
Value in 1957
$1.00
$1.91
$5.00
$9.56
$10.00
$19.12
$20.00
$38.23
$50.00
$95.58
$100
$191
$500
$956
$1,000
$1,912
$5,000
$9,558
$10,000
$19,116
$100,000
$191,156
$1,000,000
$1,911,565
Inflation by spending category, 1941–1957
Between 1941 and 1957, food rose the most, up 120.6%, while transportation rose the least, up 88.4%, against 91.2% for all items. The headline number is an average; here is what $100 of 1941
spending costs in 1957, by category:
Category
Avg. yearly inflation
$100 in 1941 →
All items (CPI-U)
4.13%
$191
Food
5.07%
$221
Apparel
4.27%
$195
Medical care
4.07%
$189
Transportation
4.04%
$188
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–).
Decade by decade: 1941 to 1957
Prices climbed fastest in the 1940s, averaging 5.65% a year, and slowest in the 1950s (2.22% a year). Each step below chains into the full 1941–1957 change:
Years
Avg. yearly inflation
Price change
$100 from 1941, at end
1941–1950
5.65%
63.9%
$164
1950–1957
2.22%
16.6%
$191
Year by year: CPI and the value of $100 from 1941
$100 from 1941 had already become $162 by
1949, on its way to $191 in 1957; 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.
In 1957, prices rose 3.3% and $100 from 1941 had the buying
power of $191; the year's average CPI of 28.1 is the level
behind every 1957 figure on this page.
Consumer prices rose 3.3% in 1957, up from 1956’s 1.5% and
the sharpest increase since the Korean War price surge of 1951. The jump
fed a growing debate among economists over “cost-push” inflation, prices
climbing from rising wages and material costs rather than excess demand,
a debate that would recur for the next quarter century. The Federal
Reserve tightened policy to fight it, and by August the tighter money
combined with falling business investment to tip the economy into a
recession, according to the National Bureau of Economic Research’s
dating. The Cold War took a technological turn that October, when the
Soviet Union launched Sputnik, the first artificial satellite, on the
4th, stunning the American public and setting off both the Space Race and
a surge in federal science and defense spending the following year. Civil
rights reached a crisis that September in Little Rock, Arkansas: after
Governor Orval Faubus used the National Guard to block nine Black
students from Central High School, Eisenhower federalized the Guard and
sent the 101st Airborne Division to enforce the Supreme Court’s
desegregation order. Consumer prices finished 1957 183.8% above their
1913 level. First-class postage held at 3 cents, and the
minimum wage stood at $1.00 an hour.
MLA: “Inflation from 1941 to 1957: $100 is worth $191 today.” InflationCalculator.com, U.S. Bureau of Labor Statistics CPI-U data, https://inflationcalculator.com/inflation/1941-to-1957/
APA: InflationCalculator.com. Inflation from 1941 to 1957. Based on U.S. Bureau of Labor Statistics CPI-U data. Retrieved from https://inflationcalculator.com/inflation/1941-to-1957/