$100 in 1942 is worth $400 in 1978,
because prices increased 300.0% over that period, an average of
3.93% a year.
$100 in 1942 has
the same buying power as
$400
in 1978
Detailed inflation statistics
Cumulative price change
300.0%
Average inflation rate
3.93% per year
Converted amount ($100 base)
$400
Price difference ($100 base)
$300
CPI in 1942
16.3
CPI in 1978
65.2
Inflation in 1942
10.88%
Inflation in 1978
7.59%
$100 in 1942 → 1978
$400
$100 in 1978 → 1942
$25.00
What happened to prices between 1942 and 1978
Between 1942 and 1978, the Consumer Price Index went from 16.3 to 65.2.
Cumulatively, prices increased 300.0%, which works out to an average of
3.93% per year. Put differently, a dollar in 1942 bought what
$0.25 buys in 1978: the 1942 dollar
lost 75.0% of its purchasing power over
these 36 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 1978 at the same ratio, 4.00: $1,000 becomes
$4,000, and $10,000 becomes $40,000.
Amount in 1942
Value in 1978
$1.00
$4.00
$5.00
$20.00
$10.00
$40.00
$20.00
$80.00
$50.00
$200
$100
$400
$500
$2,000
$1,000
$4,000
$5,000
$20,000
$10,000
$40,000
$100,000
$400,000
$1,000,000
$4,000,000
Inflation by spending category, 1942–1978
Between 1942 and 1978, medical care rose the most, up 477.6%, while apparel rose the least, up 204.9%, against 300.0% for all items. The headline number is an average; here is what $100 of 1942
spending costs in 1978, by category:
Category
Avg. yearly inflation
$100 in 1942 →
All items (CPI-U)
3.93%
$400
Medical care
4.99%
$578
Food
4.38%
$468
Transportation
3.82%
$386
Apparel
3.14%
$305
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 1978
Prices climbed fastest in the 1970s, averaging 6.70% a year, and slowest in the 1950s (2.08% a year). Each step below chains into the full 1942–1978 change:
Years
Avg. yearly inflation
Price change
$100 from 1942, at end
1942–1950
5.01%
47.9%
$148
1950–1960
2.08%
22.8%
$182
1960–1970
2.74%
31.1%
$238
1970–1978
6.70%
68.0%
$400
Year by year: CPI and the value of $100 from 1942
$100 from 1942 had already become $182 by
1960, on its way to $400 in 1978; 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 2 years; the calculator above covers any pair of years.
The destination year: 1978
In 1978, prices rose 7.6% and $100 from 1942 had the buying
power of $400; the year's average CPI of 65.2 is the level
behind every 1978 figure on this page.
Consumer prices rose 7.6% in 1978, accelerating for a second straight year as
rising wages, a weakening dollar, and climbing energy costs outpaced the
Federal Reserve’s response. Fed chairman G. William Miller, appointed by
Carter that March, kept interest rates too low to slow the trend, a policy
later cited as one reason inflation kept building toward the following year’s
crisis. California voters responded to their own version of the problem that
June, passing Proposition 13 by nearly two to one to cap property tax rates
after years of rising home values had pushed tax bills up alongside them.
Foreign policy delivered one of the decade’s genuine breakthroughs: President
Carter brought Egyptian President Anwar Sadat and Israeli Prime Minister
Menachem Begin together for thirteen days of negotiations at Camp David that
September, producing a framework for peace between the two countries that was
signed as a treaty the following March. First-class postage rose to 15 cents
that May 29, a rate that would hold longer than any other in the decade. The
year ended in tragedy: cult leader Jim Jones directed the mass murder-suicide
of more than 900 followers at a remote settlement in Guyana that November 18.
A median household earned $15,064 in 1978, a new home sold for a median
$55,700, and gas averaged 63 cents a gallon. Consumer prices stood 558.6%
above their 1913 level, with the decade’s worst inflation
still to come.
MLA: “Inflation from 1942 to 1978: $100 is worth $400 today.” InflationCalculator.com, U.S. Bureau of Labor Statistics CPI-U data, https://inflationcalculator.com/inflation/1942-to-1978/
APA: InflationCalculator.com. Inflation from 1942 to 1978. Based on U.S. Bureau of Labor Statistics CPI-U data. Retrieved from https://inflationcalculator.com/inflation/1942-to-1978/