$100 in 1944 is worth $172 in 1962,
because prices increased 71.6% over that period, an average of
3.05% a year.
$100 in 1944 has
the same buying power as
$172
in 1962
Detailed inflation statistics
Cumulative price change
71.6%
Average inflation rate
3.05% per year
Converted amount ($100 base)
$172
Price difference ($100 base)
$71.59
CPI in 1944
17.6
CPI in 1962
30.2
Inflation in 1944
1.73%
Inflation in 1962
1.00%
$100 in 1944 → 1962
$172
$100 in 1962 → 1944
$58.28
What happened to prices between 1944 and 1962
Between 1944 and 1962, the Consumer Price Index went from 17.6 to 30.2.
Cumulatively, prices increased 71.6%, which works out to an average of
3.05% per year. Put differently, a dollar in 1944 bought what
$0.58 buys in 1962: the 1944 dollar
lost 41.7% of its purchasing power over
these 18 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 1962 at the same ratio, 1.72: $1,000 becomes
$1,716, and $10,000 becomes $17,159.
Amount in 1944
Value in 1962
$1.00
$1.72
$5.00
$8.58
$10.00
$17.16
$20.00
$34.32
$50.00
$85.80
$100
$172
$500
$858
$1,000
$1,716
$5,000
$8,580
$10,000
$17,159
$100,000
$171,591
$1,000,000
$1,715,909
Inflation by spending category, 1944–1962
Between 1944 and 1962, medical care rose the most, up 102.6%, while apparel rose the least, up 55.4%, against 71.6% for all items. The headline number is an average; here is what $100 of 1944
spending costs in 1962, by category:
Category
Avg. yearly inflation
$100 in 1944 →
All items (CPI-U)
3.05%
$172
Medical care
4.00%
$203
Transportation
3.74%
$194
Food
3.35%
$181
Apparel
2.48%
$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 1962
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 1944–1962 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
1960–1962
1.01%
2.0%
$172
Year by year: CPI and the value of $100 from 1944
$100 from 1944 had already become $152 by
1953, on its way to $172 in 1962; 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 1962, prices rose 1.0% and $100 from 1944 had the buying
power of $172; the year's average CPI of 30.2 is the level
behind every 1962 figure on this page.
Consumer prices rose 1.0% in 1962, matching 1961’s pace as
inflation stayed remarkably low and unemployment slowly declined from its
recession-era highs. That January, Kennedy’s Council of Economic Advisers
introduced “wage-price guideposts,” non-binding targets meant to keep pay
and price increases in line with productivity growth without formal
controls. The space race delivered a milestone that February, when John
Glenn’s Friendship 7 capsule circled Earth three times, making him the
first American to orbit the planet. Markets got a scare that spring: a
dispute over U.S. Steel’s April price increase, which Kennedy publicly
pressured the company into rolling back, rattled investors, and the Dow
Jones Industrial Average fell about 5.7% on May 28, its steepest one-day
drop since the 1929 crash. The year’s gravest moment came that October,
when American reconnaissance photographed Soviet nuclear missiles in
Cuba, setting off a 13-day standoff that brought the two superpowers
closer to nuclear war than at any other point in the Cold War before the
Soviet Union agreed to remove the missiles in exchange for a U.S. pledge
not to invade the island. Consumer prices finished 1962 205.1% above their
1913 level. First-class postage held at 4 cents, and the
minimum wage stayed at $1.15 an hour.
MLA: “Inflation from 1944 to 1962: $100 is worth $172 today.” InflationCalculator.com, U.S. Bureau of Labor Statistics CPI-U data, https://inflationcalculator.com/inflation/1944-to-1962/
APA: InflationCalculator.com. Inflation from 1944 to 1962. Based on U.S. Bureau of Labor Statistics CPI-U data. Retrieved from https://inflationcalculator.com/inflation/1944-to-1962/