$100 in 1944 is worth $1,219 in 2009,
because prices increased 1119.0% over that period, an average of
3.92% a year.
$100 in 1944 has
the same buying power as
$1,219
in 2009
Detailed inflation statistics
Cumulative price change
1119.0%
Average inflation rate
3.92% per year
Converted amount ($100 base)
$1,219
Price difference ($100 base)
$1,119
CPI in 1944
17.6
CPI in 2009
214.537
Inflation in 1944
1.73%
Inflation in 2009
-0.36%
$100 in 1944 → 2009
$1,219
$100 in 2009 → 1944
$8.20
What happened to prices between 1944 and 2009
Between 1944 and 2009, the Consumer Price Index went from 17.6 to 214.537.
Cumulatively, prices increased 1119.0%, which works out to an average of
3.92% per year. Put differently, a dollar in 1944 bought what
$0.08 buys in 2009: the 1944 dollar
lost 91.8% of its purchasing power over
these 65 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 2009 at the same ratio, 12.19: $1,000 becomes
$12,190, and $10,000 becomes $121,896.
Amount in 1944
Value in 2009
$1.00
$12.19
$5.00
$60.95
$10.00
$122
$20.00
$244
$50.00
$609
$100
$1,219
$500
$6,095
$1,000
$12,190
$5,000
$60,948
$10,000
$121,896
$100,000
$1,218,960
$1,000,000
$12,189,602
Inflation by spending category, 1944–2009
Between 1944 and 2009, medical care rose the most, up 3138.0%, while apparel rose the least, up 302.9%, against 1119.0% for all items. The headline number is an average; here is what $100 of 1944
spending costs in 2009, by category:
Category
Avg. yearly inflation
$100 in 1944 →
All items (CPI-U)
3.92%
$1,219
Medical care
5.50%
$3,238
Food
4.01%
$1,290
Transportation
3.80%
$1,127
Apparel
2.17%
$403
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 2009
Prices climbed fastest in the 1970s, averaging 7.82% a year, and slowest in the 1950s (2.08% a year). Each step below chains into the full 1944–2009 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
1960–1970
2.74%
31.1%
$220
1970–1980
7.82%
112.4%
$468
1980–1990
4.72%
58.6%
$743
1990–2000
2.80%
31.8%
$978
2000–2009
2.47%
24.6%
$1,219
Year by year: CPI and the value of $100 from 1944
$100 from 1944 had already become $280 by
1974, on its way to $1,219 in 2009; 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 5 years; the calculator above covers any pair of years.
The destination year: 2009
In 2009, prices fell 0.4% and $100 from 1944 had the buying
power of $1,219; the year's average CPI of 214.537 is the level
behind every 2009 figure on this page.
2009 is the rarest kind of year in the modern price data: one where the cost
of living went down. The CPI fell 0.4%, the first full-year deflation
since 1955, as the Great Recession hollowed out demand and oil unwound from
its $147 spike the summer before. Gasoline that had cost over $4 a gallon in
July 2008 averaged $2.35 in 2009, and that energy collapse dragged the
12-month inflation rate to −2.1% by July, the deepest reading since 1950.
Policymakers treated falling prices not as relief but as a warning: deflation
raises the real weight of debt precisely when households are drowning in it,
which is why the Federal Reserve pinned interest rates near zero, began buying
bonds by the hundreds of billions, and Washington passed a $787 billion
stimulus. The medicine took: prices stabilized within a year, and 2009 remains
the textbook case of why central banks fear deflation more than moderate
inflation.
MLA: “Inflation from 1944 to 2009: $100 is worth $1,219 today.” InflationCalculator.com, U.S. Bureau of Labor Statistics CPI-U data, https://inflationcalculator.com/inflation/1944-to-2009/
APA: InflationCalculator.com. Inflation from 1944 to 2009. Based on U.S. Bureau of Labor Statistics CPI-U data. Retrieved from https://inflationcalculator.com/inflation/1944-to-2009/