$100 in 1945 is worth $144 in 1951,
because prices increased 44.4% over that period, an average of
6.32% a year.
$100 in 1945 has
the same buying power as
$144
in 1951
Detailed inflation statistics
Cumulative price change
44.4%
Average inflation rate
6.32% per year
Converted amount ($100 base)
$144
Price difference ($100 base)
$44.44
CPI in 1945
18
CPI in 1951
26
Inflation in 1945
2.27%
Inflation in 1951
7.88%
$100 in 1945 → 1951
$144
$100 in 1951 → 1945
$69.23
What happened to prices between 1945 and 1951
Between 1945 and 1951, the Consumer Price Index went from 18 to 26.
Cumulatively, prices increased 44.4%, which works out to an average of
6.32% per year. Put differently, a dollar in 1945 bought what
$0.69 buys in 1951: the 1945 dollar
lost 30.8% of its purchasing power over
these 6 years.
Consumer prices rose 2.3% in 1945, up from 1944’s 1.7% but
still modest, a rate that understated how much pressure had built up behind
wartime price and wage controls, which stayed largely in place even as the
conflict that justified them came to a close. The year opened with a shock
at home: Franklin Roosevelt died of a cerebral hemorrhage on April 12, less
than three months into an unprecedented fourth term, and Vice President
Harry Truman was sworn in that same afternoon. The war Roosevelt had led for
nearly four years ended without him. Germany surrendered on May 8, and
Japan surrendered on August 15, after atomic bombs fell on Hiroshima and
Nagasaki that month, with the formal signing aboard the USS Missouri on
September 2. Domestic policy kept moving even as the guns fell silent: the
federal minimum wage rose to 40 cents an hour that October 24, the final
step of the schedule Congress had built into the 1938 Fair Labor Standards
Act, up from 30 cents in 1939 and 25 cents at the law’s start. Consumer
prices stood 81.8% above their 1913 level, a gain that would
look modest next to what followed once wartime controls actually came off.
First-class postage held at 3 cents.
Every 1945 amount converts to 1951 at the same ratio, 1.44: $1,000 becomes
$1,444, and $10,000 becomes $14,444.
Amount in 1945
Value in 1951
$1.00
$1.44
$5.00
$7.22
$10.00
$14.44
$20.00
$28.89
$50.00
$72.22
$100
$144
$500
$722
$1,000
$1,444
$5,000
$7,222
$10,000
$14,444
$100,000
$144,444
$1,000,000
$1,444,444
Inflation by spending category, 1945–1951
Between 1945 and 1951, food rose the most, up 63.0%, while medical care rose the least, up 33.6%, against 44.4% for all items. The headline number is an average; here is what $100 of 1945
spending costs in 1951, by category:
Category
Avg. yearly inflation
$100 in 1945 →
All items (CPI-U)
6.32%
$144
Food
8.48%
$163
Transportation
7.18%
$152
Apparel
5.74%
$140
Medical care
4.95%
$134
Not shown because the BLS began these indexes after 1945: core (all items less food & energy) (1957–), energy (1957–), housing (1967–), recreation (1993–), education & communication (1993–).
Decade by decade: 1945 to 1951
Prices climbed fastest in the 1950s, averaging 7.88% a year, and slowest in the 1940s (6.01% a year). Each step below chains into the full 1945–1951 change:
Years
Avg. yearly inflation
Price change
$100 from 1945, at end
1945–1950
6.01%
33.9%
$134
1950–1951
7.88%
7.9%
$144
Year by year: CPI and the value of $100 from 1945
$100 from 1945 had already become $134 by
1948, on its way to $144 in 1951; 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 1951, prices rose 7.9% and $100 from 1945 had the buying
power of $144; the year's average CPI of 26 is the level
behind every 1951 figure on this page.
Consumer prices rose 7.9% in 1951, up sharply from 1950’s
1.3% and the fastest increase since 1947, as Korean War buying and a
defense spending surge hit an economy still adjusting to peacetime. Much
of the jump came early in the year, before the government stepped in: the
Office of Price Stabilization imposed a general ceiling on prices January
26, and the Wage Stabilization Board froze wages soon after, the broadest
peacetime controls since the war began that June. The year’s more lasting
change came in monetary policy. On March 4, the Treasury and the Federal
Reserve signed the Accord, ending the Fed’s wartime obligation to hold
down interest rates on government bonds and freeing the central bank to
fight inflation on its own terms for the first time since 1942, a shift
that would shape Fed independence for decades. Congress raised taxes that
October to help pay for the war: the Revenue Act of 1951, signed October
20, lifted individual and corporate income taxes along with a range of
excise taxes, the third increase in taxes since fighting began in Korea.
Consumer prices finished 1951 162.6% above their 1913
level. First-class postage held at 3 cents, and the minimum wage stayed at
75 cents an hour.
MLA: “Inflation from 1945 to 1951: $100 is worth $144 today.” InflationCalculator.com, U.S. Bureau of Labor Statistics CPI-U data, https://inflationcalculator.com/inflation/1945-to-1951/
APA: InflationCalculator.com. Inflation from 1945 to 1951. Based on U.S. Bureau of Labor Statistics CPI-U data. Retrieved from https://inflationcalculator.com/inflation/1945-to-1951/