$100 in 1942 is worth $163 in 1952,
because prices increased 62.6% over that period, an average of
4.98% a year.
$100 in 1942 has
the same buying power as
$163
in 1952
Detailed inflation statistics
Cumulative price change
62.6%
Average inflation rate
4.98% per year
Converted amount ($100 base)
$163
Price difference ($100 base)
$62.58
CPI in 1942
16.3
CPI in 1952
26.5
Inflation in 1942
10.88%
Inflation in 1952
1.92%
$100 in 1942 → 1952
$163
$100 in 1952 → 1942
$61.51
What happened to prices between 1942 and 1952
Between 1942 and 1952, the Consumer Price Index went from 16.3 to 26.5.
Cumulatively, prices increased 62.6%, which works out to an average of
4.98% per year. Put differently, a dollar in 1942 bought what
$0.62 buys in 1952: the 1942 dollar
lost 38.5% of its purchasing power over
these 10 years.
Consumer prices rose 10.9% in 1942, up from 1941’s already
rapid 5.0% and the fastest increase since 1920, as the economy’s crash
conversion to war production collided with shrinking supplies of civilian
goods. The government tried to contain it: the General Maximum Price
Regulation, effective May 18 and known as “General Max,” froze most retail
prices at their highest March level, the broadest price control Washington
had ever attempted. Rationing followed close behind. Sugar rationing began
that May and gasoline rationing went nationwide in December, the leading
edge of a system that would eventually cover meat, coffee, shoes, tires, and
dozens of other goods before the war ended. The year’s other defining
wartime measure had nothing to do with prices. Executive Order 9066, signed
February 19, authorized the military to remove more than 110,000 Japanese
Americans, most of them U.S. citizens, from the West Coast and hold them in
inland internment camps for the war’s duration, one of the era’s starkest
violations of civil liberties. Even with price controls in place, consumer
prices climbed more than 10% for the first time since 1920, leaving the CPI
64.6% above its 1913 level. First-class postage held at 3
cents, and the minimum wage stayed at 30 cents an hour.
Every 1942 amount converts to 1952 at the same ratio, 1.63: $1,000 becomes
$1,626, and $10,000 becomes $16,258.
Amount in 1942
Value in 1952
$1.00
$1.63
$5.00
$8.13
$10.00
$16.26
$20.00
$32.52
$50.00
$81.29
$100
$163
$500
$813
$1,000
$1,626
$5,000
$8,129
$10,000
$16,258
$100,000
$162,577
$1,000,000
$1,625,767
Inflation by spending category, 1942–1952
Between 1942 and 1952, food rose the most, up 86.4%, while medical care rose the least, up 56.1%, against 62.6% for all items. The headline number is an average; here is what $100 of 1942
spending costs in 1952, by category:
Category
Avg. yearly inflation
$100 in 1942 →
All items (CPI-U)
4.98%
$163
Food
6.42%
$186
Apparel
5.00%
$163
Transportation
4.85%
$161
Medical care
4.55%
$156
Not shown because the BLS began these indexes after 1942: core (all items less food & energy) (1957–), energy (1957–), housing (1967–), recreation (1993–), education & communication (1993–).
Decade by decade: 1942 to 1952
Prices climbed fastest in the 1940s, averaging 5.01% a year, and slowest in the 1950s (4.86% a year). Each step below chains into the full 1942–1952 change:
Years
Avg. yearly inflation
Price change
$100 from 1942, at end
1942–1950
5.01%
47.9%
$148
1950–1952
4.86%
10.0%
$163
Year by year: CPI and the value of $100 from 1942
$100 from 1942 had already become $137 by
1947, on its way to $163 in 1952; 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 1952, prices rose 1.9% and $100 from 1942 had the buying
power of $163; the year's average CPI of 26.5 is the level
behind every 1952 figure on this page.
Consumer prices rose 1.9% in 1952, down sharply from 1951’s
7.9% as the price and wage controls imposed the year before held the cost
of living in check even with the Korean War still underway. Labor strife
tested those controls that spring: to head off a strike that could have
disrupted war production, President Truman ordered the government to
seize the steel industry that April, over the objections of steel
companies fighting the price the Office of Price Stabilization had set for
their product. The Supreme Court ruled the seizure unconstitutional in
Youngstown Sheet & Tube Co. v. Sawyer that June, a landmark limit on
presidential power, and steelworkers then struck for 53 days before a
settlement. Politics delivered the year’s biggest change that November:
Dwight Eisenhower defeated Adlai Stevenson, promising to “go to Korea” to
end the war and returning Republicans to the White House for the first
time since 1933. The Cold War’s technological edge sharpened that same
month, when the United States tested the first hydrogen bomb at Enewetak
Atoll on November 1, a device hundreds of times more powerful than the
atomic bombs used against Japan in 1945. Consumer prices finished 1952
167.7% above their 1913 level. First-class postage held at
3 cents, and the minimum wage stayed at 75 cents an hour.
MLA: “Inflation from 1942 to 1952: $100 is worth $163 today.” InflationCalculator.com, U.S. Bureau of Labor Statistics CPI-U data, https://inflationcalculator.com/inflation/1942-to-1952/
APA: InflationCalculator.com. Inflation from 1942 to 1952. Based on U.S. Bureau of Labor Statistics CPI-U data. Retrieved from https://inflationcalculator.com/inflation/1942-to-1952/