$100 in 1941 is worth $1,285 in 2004,
because prices increased 1185.0% over that period, an average of
4.14% a year.
$100 in 1941 has
the same buying power as
$1,285
in 2004
Detailed inflation statistics
Cumulative price change
1185.0%
Average inflation rate
4.14% per year
Converted amount ($100 base)
$1,285
Price difference ($100 base)
$1,185
CPI in 1941
14.7
CPI in 2004
188.9
Inflation in 1941
5.00%
Inflation in 2004
2.66%
$100 in 1941 → 2004
$1,285
$100 in 2004 → 1941
$7.78
What happened to prices between 1941 and 2004
Between 1941 and 2004, the Consumer Price Index went from 14.7 to 188.9.
Cumulatively, prices increased 1185.0%, which works out to an average of
4.14% per year. Put differently, a dollar in 1941 bought what
$0.08 buys in 2004: the 1941 dollar
lost 92.2% of its purchasing power over
these 63 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 2004 at the same ratio, 12.85: $1,000 becomes
$12,850, and $10,000 becomes $128,503.
Amount in 1941
Value in 2004
$1.00
$12.85
$5.00
$64.25
$10.00
$129
$20.00
$257
$50.00
$643
$100
$1,285
$500
$6,425
$1,000
$12,850
$5,000
$64,252
$10,000
$128,503
$100,000
$1,285,034
$1,000,000
$12,850,340
Inflation by spending category, 1941–2004
Between 1941 and 2004, medical care rose the most, up 2881.7%, while apparel rose the least, up 428.1%, against 1185.0% for all items. The headline number is an average; here is what $100 of 1941
spending costs in 2004, by category:
Category
Avg. yearly inflation
$100 in 1941 →
All items (CPI-U)
4.14%
$1,285
Medical care
5.54%
$2,982
Food
4.30%
$1,421
Transportation
3.89%
$1,110
Apparel
2.68%
$528
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 2004
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 1941–2004 change:
Years
Avg. yearly inflation
Price change
$100 from 1941, at end
1941–1950
5.65%
63.9%
$164
1950–1960
2.08%
22.8%
$201
1960–1970
2.74%
31.1%
$264
1970–1980
7.82%
112.4%
$561
1980–1990
4.72%
58.6%
$889
1990–2000
2.80%
31.8%
$1,171
2000–2004
2.34%
9.7%
$1,285
Year by year: CPI and the value of $100 from 1941
$100 from 1941 had already become $276 by
1971, on its way to $1,285 in 2004; 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: 2004
In 2004, prices rose 2.7% and $100 from 1941 had the buying
power of $1,285; the year's average CPI of 188.9 is the level
behind every 2004 figure on this page.
Consumer prices rose 2.7% in 2004, with a 29-cent jump in the price of gasoline, to $1.88 a
gallon, doing much of the work. Crude oil passed $50 a barrel in October on rising demand
from China and India. The Federal Reserve raised rates for the first time in four years on
June 30, to 1.25%, and it kept going: 17 consecutive quarter-point increases took the rate to
5.25% by June 2006. Housing was already running ahead of incomes. The median household earned
about $44,300, up 2.3% from 2003, while the median new home sold for $221,000, up about 13%. A
first-class stamp stayed at 37 cents and the federal minimum wage at $5.15, unchanged since
1997.
MLA: “Inflation from 1941 to 2004: $100 is worth $1,285 today.” InflationCalculator.com, U.S. Bureau of Labor Statistics CPI-U data, https://inflationcalculator.com/inflation/1941-to-2004/
APA: InflationCalculator.com. Inflation from 1941 to 2004. Based on U.S. Bureau of Labor Statistics CPI-U data. Retrieved from https://inflationcalculator.com/inflation/1941-to-2004/