$100 in 1946 is worth $144 in 1957,
because prices increased 44.1% over that period, an average of
3.38% a year.
$100 in 1946 has
the same buying power as
$144
in 1957
Detailed inflation statistics
Cumulative price change
44.1%
Average inflation rate
3.38% per year
Converted amount ($100 base)
$144
Price difference ($100 base)
$44.10
CPI in 1946
19.5
CPI in 1957
28.1
Inflation in 1946
8.33%
Inflation in 1957
3.31%
$100 in 1946 → 1957
$144
$100 in 1957 → 1946
$69.40
What happened to prices between 1946 and 1957
Between 1946 and 1957, the Consumer Price Index went from 19.5 to 28.1.
Cumulatively, prices increased 44.1%, which works out to an average of
3.38% per year. Put differently, a dollar in 1946 bought what
$0.69 buys in 1957: the 1946 dollar
lost 30.6% of its purchasing power over
these 11 years.
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.
Every 1946 amount converts to 1957 at the same ratio, 1.44: $1,000 becomes
$1,441, and $10,000 becomes $14,410.
Amount in 1946
Value in 1957
$1.00
$1.44
$5.00
$7.21
$10.00
$14.41
$20.00
$28.82
$50.00
$72.05
$100
$144
$500
$721
$1,000
$1,441
$5,000
$7,205
$10,000
$14,410
$100,000
$144,103
$1,000,000
$1,441,026
Inflation by spending category, 1946–1957
Between 1946 and 1957, transportation rose the most, up 65.9%, while apparel rose the least, up 29.4%, against 44.1% for all items. The headline number is an average; here is what $100 of 1946
spending costs in 1957, by category:
Category
Avg. yearly inflation
$100 in 1946 →
All items (CPI-U)
3.38%
$144
Transportation
4.71%
$166
Medical care
4.22%
$158
Food
3.50%
$146
Apparel
2.37%
$129
Not shown because the BLS began these indexes after 1946: core (all items less food & energy) (1957–), energy (1957–), housing (1967–), recreation (1993–), education & communication (1993–).
Decade by decade: 1946 to 1957
Prices climbed fastest in the 1940s, averaging 5.44% a year, and slowest in the 1950s (2.22% a year). Each step below chains into the full 1946–1957 change:
Years
Avg. yearly inflation
Price change
$100 from 1946, at end
1946–1950
5.44%
23.6%
$124
1950–1957
2.22%
16.6%
$144
Year by year: CPI and the value of $100 from 1946
$100 from 1946 had already become $133 by
1951, on its way to $144 in 1957; 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 1957, prices rose 3.3% and $100 from 1946 had the buying
power of $144; the year's average CPI of 28.1 is the level
behind every 1957 figure on this page.
Consumer prices rose 3.3% in 1957, up from 1956’s 1.5% and
the sharpest increase since the Korean War price surge of 1951. The jump
fed a growing debate among economists over “cost-push” inflation, prices
climbing from rising wages and material costs rather than excess demand,
a debate that would recur for the next quarter century. The Federal
Reserve tightened policy to fight it, and by August the tighter money
combined with falling business investment to tip the economy into a
recession, according to the National Bureau of Economic Research’s
dating. The Cold War took a technological turn that October, when the
Soviet Union launched Sputnik, the first artificial satellite, on the
4th, stunning the American public and setting off both the Space Race and
a surge in federal science and defense spending the following year. Civil
rights reached a crisis that September in Little Rock, Arkansas: after
Governor Orval Faubus used the National Guard to block nine Black
students from Central High School, Eisenhower federalized the Guard and
sent the 101st Airborne Division to enforce the Supreme Court’s
desegregation order. Consumer prices finished 1957 183.8% above their
1913 level. First-class postage held at 3 cents, and the
minimum wage stood at $1.00 an hour.
MLA: “Inflation from 1946 to 1957: $100 is worth $144 today.” InflationCalculator.com, U.S. Bureau of Labor Statistics CPI-U data, https://inflationcalculator.com/inflation/1946-to-1957/
APA: InflationCalculator.com. Inflation from 1946 to 1957. Based on U.S. Bureau of Labor Statistics CPI-U data. Retrieved from https://inflationcalculator.com/inflation/1946-to-1957/