$100 in 1947 is worth $126 in 1957,
because prices increased 26.0% over that period, an average of
2.34% a year.
$100 in 1947 has
the same buying power as
$126
in 1957
Detailed inflation statistics
Cumulative price change
26.0%
Average inflation rate
2.34% per year
Converted amount ($100 base)
$126
Price difference ($100 base)
$26.01
CPI in 1947
22.3
CPI in 1957
28.1
Inflation in 1947
14.36%
Inflation in 1957
3.31%
$100 in 1947 → 1957
$126
$100 in 1957 → 1947
$79.36
What happened to prices between 1947 and 1957
Between 1947 and 1957, the Consumer Price Index went from 22.3 to 28.1.
Cumulatively, prices increased 26.0%, which works out to an average of
2.34% per year. Put differently, a dollar in 1947 bought what
$0.79 buys in 1957: the 1947 dollar
lost 20.6% of its purchasing power over
these 10 years.
Consumer prices rose 14.4% in 1947, up from 1946’s 8.3% and
the fastest annual increase since 1920, as the last of the wartime price
controls disappeared and a year of strikes, wage catch-up, and lingering
shortages hit consumers all at once. Congress answered the previous year’s
strike wave that June, overriding President Truman’s veto to pass the
Taft-Hartley Act, which banned secondary boycotts and the closed shop and
let states adopt “right-to-work” laws curbing union power. American
attention was also turning outward. In a June 5 speech at Harvard,
Secretary of State George Marshall outlined a U.S.-funded plan to rebuild
Western Europe’s economies, an effort that would become known as the
Marshall Plan once Congress funded it the following year. The government
reorganized itself for the confrontation with the Soviet Union that plan was
partly designed to prevent: the National Security Act, signed July 26,
created the Department of Defense, the Air Force as a separate service, the
Central Intelligence Agency, and the National Security Council. Consumer
prices stood 125.3% above their 1913 level and 30.4% above
1929’s pre-Depression peak, up from just 1.2% above it four
years earlier. First-class postage held at 3 cents, and the minimum wage
stayed at 40 cents an hour.
Every 1947 amount converts to 1957 at the same ratio, 1.26: $1,000 becomes
$1,260, and $10,000 becomes $12,601.
Amount in 1947
Value in 1957
$1.00
$1.26
$5.00
$6.30
$10.00
$12.60
$20.00
$25.20
$50.00
$63.00
$100
$126
$500
$630
$1,000
$1,260
$5,000
$6,300
$10,000
$12,601
$100,000
$126,009
$1,000,000
$1,260,090
Inflation by spending category, 1947–1957
Between 1947 and 1957, transportation rose the most, up 49.7%, while apparel rose the least, up 11.5%, against 26.0% for all items. The headline number is an average; here is what $100 of 1947
spending costs in 1957, by category:
Category
Avg. yearly inflation
$100 in 1947 →
All items (CPI-U)
2.34%
$126
Transportation
4.12%
$150
Medical care
3.85%
$146
Food
1.83%
$120
Apparel
1.10%
$112
Not shown because the BLS began these indexes after 1947: core (all items less food & energy) (1957–), energy (1957–), housing (1967–), recreation (1993–), education & communication (1993–).
Decade by decade: 1947 to 1957
Prices climbed fastest in the 1940s, averaging 2.62% a year, and slowest in the 1950s (2.22% a year). Each step below chains into the full 1947–1957 change:
Years
Avg. yearly inflation
Price change
$100 from 1947, at end
1947–1950
2.62%
8.1%
$108
1950–1957
2.22%
16.6%
$126
Year by year: CPI and the value of $100 from 1947
$100 from 1947 had already become $119 by
1952, on its way to $126 in 1957; each row shows the CPI, that
year's inflation rate, and the running value.
Within the span, inflation peaked at 8.1% in 1948, and prices fell 1.2% in 1949, the deepest deflation of the period.
In 1957, prices rose 3.3% and $100 from 1947 had the buying
power of $126; 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 1947 to 1957: $100 is worth $126 today.” InflationCalculator.com, U.S. Bureau of Labor Statistics CPI-U data, https://inflationcalculator.com/inflation/1947-to-1957/
APA: InflationCalculator.com. Inflation from 1947 to 1957. Based on U.S. Bureau of Labor Statistics CPI-U data. Retrieved from https://inflationcalculator.com/inflation/1947-to-1957/