$100 in 1944 is worth $170 in 1961,
because prices increased 69.9% over that period, an average of
3.17% a year.
$100 in 1944 has
the same buying power as
$170
in 1961
Detailed inflation statistics
Cumulative price change
69.9%
Average inflation rate
3.17% per year
Converted amount ($100 base)
$170
Price difference ($100 base)
$69.89
CPI in 1944
17.6
CPI in 1961
29.9
Inflation in 1944
1.73%
Inflation in 1961
1.01%
$100 in 1944 → 1961
$170
$100 in 1961 → 1944
$58.86
What happened to prices between 1944 and 1961
Between 1944 and 1961, the Consumer Price Index went from 17.6 to 29.9.
Cumulatively, prices increased 69.9%, which works out to an average of
3.17% per year. Put differently, a dollar in 1944 bought what
$0.59 buys in 1961: the 1944 dollar
lost 41.1% of its purchasing power over
these 17 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 1961 at the same ratio, 1.70: $1,000 becomes
$1,699, and $10,000 becomes $16,989.
Amount in 1944
Value in 1961
$1.00
$1.70
$5.00
$8.49
$10.00
$16.99
$20.00
$33.98
$50.00
$84.94
$100
$170
$500
$849
$1,000
$1,699
$5,000
$8,494
$10,000
$16,989
$100,000
$169,886
$1,000,000
$1,698,864
Inflation by spending category, 1944–1961
Between 1944 and 1961, medical care rose the most, up 97.4%, while apparel rose the least, up 54.7%, against 69.9% for all items. The headline number is an average; here is what $100 of 1944
spending costs in 1961, by category:
Category
Avg. yearly inflation
$100 in 1944 →
All items (CPI-U)
3.17%
$170
Medical care
4.08%
$197
Transportation
3.83%
$189
Food
3.51%
$180
Apparel
2.60%
$155
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–).
Decade by decade: 1944 to 1961
Prices climbed fastest in the 1940s, averaging 5.38% a year, and slowest in the 1960s (1.01% a year). Each step below chains into the full 1944–1961 change:
Years
Avg. yearly inflation
Price change
$100 from 1944, at end
1944–1950
5.38%
36.9%
$137
1950–1960
2.08%
22.8%
$168
1960–1961
1.01%
1.0%
$170
Year by year: CPI and the value of $100 from 1944
$100 from 1944 had already become $151 by
1952, on its way to $170 in 1961; 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 1961, prices rose 1.0% and $100 from 1944 had the buying
power of $170; the year's average CPI of 29.9 is the level
behind every 1961 figure on this page.
Consumer prices rose 1.0% in 1961, down from 1960’s 1.7% as
the economy climbed out of recession, a recovery the National Bureau of
Economic Research dates to that February. Politically, the year opened
with a changing of the guard: outgoing president Dwight Eisenhower’s
farewell address on January 17 warned of a growing “military-industrial
complex,” and three days later John F. Kennedy was sworn in, urging
Americans to “ask not what your country can do for you.” The new
administration’s first major foreign-policy test came quickly and badly:
a CIA-organized force of Cuban exiles landed at the Bay of Pigs on April
17 aiming to topple Fidel Castro, and without the U.S. air support Kennedy
withheld, the invasion collapsed within three days. Cold War tensions
hardened further that August, when East German forces sealed the border
between East and West Berlin overnight, building what would become the
Berlin Wall and stopping the flow of refugees to the West. Domestically,
the wage floor moved for the first time in five years: the Fair Labor
Standards Amendments of 1961, effective that September, raised the
minimum wage to $1.15 an hour and extended coverage to roughly 3.6 million
additional workers. Consumer prices finished 1961 202.0% above their
1913 level. First-class postage held at 4 cents.
MLA: “Inflation from 1944 to 1961: $100 is worth $170 today.” InflationCalculator.com, U.S. Bureau of Labor Statistics CPI-U data, https://inflationcalculator.com/inflation/1944-to-1961/
APA: InflationCalculator.com. Inflation from 1944 to 1961. Based on U.S. Bureau of Labor Statistics CPI-U data. Retrieved from https://inflationcalculator.com/inflation/1944-to-1961/