$100 in 1944 is worth $111 in 1946,
because prices increased 10.8% over that period, an average of
5.26% a year.
$100 in 1944 has
the same buying power as
$111
in 1946
Detailed inflation statistics
Cumulative price change
10.8%
Average inflation rate
5.26% per year
Converted amount ($100 base)
$111
Price difference ($100 base)
$10.80
CPI in 1944
17.6
CPI in 1946
19.5
Inflation in 1944
1.73%
Inflation in 1946
8.33%
$100 in 1944 → 1946
$111
$100 in 1946 → 1944
$90.26
What happened to prices between 1944 and 1946
Between 1944 and 1946, the Consumer Price Index went from 17.6 to 19.5.
Cumulatively, prices increased 10.8%, which works out to an average of
5.26% per year. Put differently, a dollar in 1944 bought what
$0.90 buys in 1946: the 1944 dollar
lost 9.7% of its purchasing power over
these 2 years.
Consumer prices rose just 1.7% in 1944, down from 1943’s
6.1% and the slowest increase of the war years, as price and wage controls
held the cost of living nearly flat even as the conflict reached its most
expensive phase. The war itself turned decisively that June, when more than
150,000 Allied troops landed on the beaches of Normandy, France, opening the
long-planned second front against Nazi Germany. Congress used the same
month to plan for the war’s end, passing the GI Bill on June 22 to give
returning veterans money for college or vocational training, low-cost home
and business loans, and unemployment benefits, a package that would reshape
American housing and higher education for a generation. The following
month, delegates from 44 Allied nations gathered at Bretton Woods, New
Hampshire, and agreed to peg their currencies to the U.S. dollar, itself
pegged to gold, creating the International Monetary Fund and the World Bank
to manage the new system. Consumer prices stood 77.8% above their
1913 level, a cumulative wartime rise held down by controls
that would start unwinding the following year. First-class postage held at
3 cents, and the minimum wage stayed at 30 cents an hour.
Every 1944 amount converts to 1946 at the same ratio, 1.11: $1,000 becomes
$1,108, and $10,000 becomes $11,080.
Amount in 1944
Value in 1946
$1.00
$1.11
$5.00
$5.54
$10.00
$11.08
$20.00
$22.16
$50.00
$55.40
$100
$111
$500
$554
$1,000
$1,108
$5,000
$5,540
$10,000
$11,080
$100,000
$110,795
$1,000,000
$1,107,955
Inflation by spending category, 1944–1946
Between 1944 and 1946, food rose the most, up 17.2%, while transportation rose the least, up 5.0%, against 10.8% for all items. The headline number is an average; here is what $100 of 1944
spending costs in 1946, by category:
Category
Avg. yearly inflation
$100 in 1944 →
All items (CPI-U)
5.26%
$111
Food
8.24%
$117
Apparel
7.44%
$115
Medical care
3.81%
$108
Transportation
2.48%
$105
Not shown because the BLS began these indexes after 1944: 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 1944
$100 from 1944 had already become $102 by
1945, on its way to $111 in 1946; each row shows the CPI, that
year's inflation rate, and the running value.
Within the span, inflation peaked at 8.3% in 1946, and the smallest rise was 2.3% in 1945.
In 1946, prices rose 8.3% and $100 from 1944 had the buying
power of $111; 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 1944 to 1946: $100 is worth $111 today.” InflationCalculator.com, U.S. Bureau of Labor Statistics CPI-U data, https://inflationcalculator.com/inflation/1944-to-1946/
APA: InflationCalculator.com. Inflation from 1944 to 1946. Based on U.S. Bureau of Labor Statistics CPI-U data. Retrieved from https://inflationcalculator.com/inflation/1944-to-1946/