$100 in 1946 is worth $533 in 1984,
because prices increased 432.8% over that period, an average of
4.50% a year.
$100 in 1946 has
the same buying power as
$533
in 1984
Detailed inflation statistics
Cumulative price change
432.8%
Average inflation rate
4.50% per year
Converted amount ($100 base)
$533
Price difference ($100 base)
$433
CPI in 1946
19.5
CPI in 1984
103.9
Inflation in 1946
8.33%
Inflation in 1984
4.32%
$100 in 1946 → 1984
$533
$100 in 1984 → 1946
$18.77
What happened to prices between 1946 and 1984
Between 1946 and 1984, the Consumer Price Index went from 19.5 to 103.9.
Cumulatively, prices increased 432.8%, which works out to an average of
4.50% per year. Put differently, a dollar in 1946 bought what
$0.19 buys in 1984: the 1946 dollar
lost 81.2% of its purchasing power over
these 38 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 1984 at the same ratio, 5.33: $1,000 becomes
$5,328, and $10,000 becomes $53,282.
Amount in 1946
Value in 1984
$1.00
$5.33
$5.00
$26.64
$10.00
$53.28
$20.00
$107
$50.00
$266
$100
$533
$500
$2,664
$1,000
$5,328
$5,000
$26,641
$10,000
$53,282
$100,000
$532,821
$1,000,000
$5,328,205
Inflation by spending category, 1946–1984
Between 1946 and 1984, medical care rose the most, up 754.4%, while apparel rose the least, up 196.8%, against 432.8% for all items. The headline number is an average; here is what $100 of 1946
spending costs in 1984, by category:
Category
Avg. yearly inflation
$100 in 1946 →
All items (CPI-U)
4.50%
$533
Medical care
5.81%
$854
Transportation
4.92%
$621
Food
4.44%
$521
Apparel
2.90%
$297
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 1984
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 1946–1984 change:
Years
Avg. yearly inflation
Price change
$100 from 1946, at end
1946–1950
5.44%
23.6%
$124
1950–1960
2.08%
22.8%
$152
1960–1970
2.74%
31.1%
$199
1970–1980
7.82%
112.4%
$423
1980–1984
5.97%
26.1%
$533
Year by year: CPI and the value of $100 from 1946
$100 from 1946 had already become $159 by
1964, on its way to $533 in 1984; 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 2 years; the calculator above covers any pair of years.
The destination year: 1984
In 1984, prices rose 4.3% and $100 from 1946 had the buying
power of $533; the year's average CPI of 103.9 is the level
behind every 1984 figure on this page.
1984 was the year the recovery became a boom. Real GDP grew 7.2%, the
fastest calendar-year growth since 1951, as the tax cuts passed in 1981
combined with falling interest rates and rebuilding consumer confidence.
Unemployment, which had topped 10.8% just two years earlier, fell below
7.5%. Inflation ticked up to 4.3% from 3.2% the year before, but nothing
close to a return of the 1970s wage-price spiral: the Federal Reserve under
Paul Volcker kept policy tight enough to hold the line while growth ran hot.
The strength of the expansion, branded “Morning in America” in President
Reagan’s reelection campaign, carried him to a 49-state landslide over
Walter Mondale that November, at the time the widest electoral-vote margin
in U.S. history. For households, the numbers behind the slogan were
concrete: median income rose to about $22,400, and a gallon of gas cost
$1.13, roughly what it had cost three years earlier even as wages kept
climbing. The contrast with 1980, when 13.5% inflation and interest rates
near 20% had defined the economy, could not have been sharper.
MLA: “Inflation from 1946 to 1984: $100 is worth $533 today.” InflationCalculator.com, U.S. Bureau of Labor Statistics CPI-U data, https://inflationcalculator.com/inflation/1946-to-1984/
APA: InflationCalculator.com. Inflation from 1946 to 1984. Based on U.S. Bureau of Labor Statistics CPI-U data. Retrieved from https://inflationcalculator.com/inflation/1946-to-1984/