$100 in 1947 is worth $1,126 in 2018,
because prices increased 1026.0% over that period, an average of
3.47% a year.
$100 in 1947 has
the same buying power as
$1,126
in 2018
Detailed inflation statistics
Cumulative price change
1026.0%
Average inflation rate
3.47% per year
Converted amount ($100 base)
$1,126
Price difference ($100 base)
$1,026
CPI in 1947
22.3
CPI in 2018
251.107
Inflation in 1947
14.36%
Inflation in 2018
2.44%
$100 in 1947 → 2018
$1,126
$100 in 2018 → 1947
$8.88
What happened to prices between 1947 and 2018
Between 1947 and 2018, the Consumer Price Index went from 22.3 to 251.107.
Cumulatively, prices increased 1026.0%, which works out to an average of
3.47% per year. Put differently, a dollar in 1947 bought what
$0.09 buys in 2018: the 1947 dollar
lost 91.1% of its purchasing power over
these 71 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 2018 at the same ratio, 11.26: $1,000 becomes
$11,260, and $10,000 becomes $112,604.
Amount in 1947
Value in 2018
$1.00
$11.26
$5.00
$56.30
$10.00
$113
$20.00
$225
$50.00
$563
$100
$1,126
$500
$5,630
$1,000
$11,260
$5,000
$56,302
$10,000
$112,604
$100,000
$1,126,040
$1,000,000
$11,260,404
Inflation by spending category, 1947–2018
Between 1947 and 2018, medical care rose the most, up 3490.4%, while apparel rose the least, up 214.9%, against 1026.0% for all items. The headline number is an average; here is what $100 of 1947
spending costs in 2018, by category:
Category
Avg. yearly inflation
$100 in 1947 →
All items (CPI-U)
3.47%
$1,126
Medical care
5.17%
$3,590
Transportation
3.49%
$1,139
Food
3.37%
$1,052
Apparel
1.63%
$315
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 2018
Prices climbed fastest in the 1970s, averaging 7.82% a year, and slowest in the 2010s (1.78% a year). Each step below chains into the full 1947–2018 change:
Years
Avg. yearly inflation
Price change
$100 from 1947, at end
1947–1950
2.62%
8.1%
$108
1950–1960
2.08%
22.8%
$133
1960–1970
2.74%
31.1%
$174
1970–1980
7.82%
112.4%
$370
1980–1990
4.72%
58.6%
$586
1990–2000
2.80%
31.8%
$772
2000–2010
2.39%
26.6%
$978
2010–2018
1.78%
15.2%
$1,126
Year by year: CPI and the value of $100 from 1947
$100 from 1947 had already become $433 by
1982, on its way to $1,126 in 2018; each row shows the CPI, that
year's inflation rate, and the running value.
Within the span, inflation peaked at 13.5% in 1980, 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: 2018
In 2018, prices rose 2.4% and $100 from 1947 had the buying
power of $1,126; the year's average CPI of 251.107 is the level
behind every 2018 figure on this page.
2018 was the peak of the late-2010s expansion. Consumer prices rose 2.4%,
the fastest since 2011, with gasoline averaging $2.72 a gallon after a summer
high. Unemployment fell to 3.7% in September, the lowest since 1969, and median
household income reached $63,179. The median new home sold for about $331,800,
and a first-class stamp cost 50 cents. The federal minimum wage was still $7.25.
Trade policy became a price factor for the first time in decades. New tariffs
on steel, aluminum, and a growing list of Chinese goods raised costs for
manufacturers and some consumer products, and retaliation cut into exports of
soybeans and other farm goods.
The Federal Reserve, led from February by Jerome Powell, raised rates four
times to 2.25–2.50%. A stock-market drop of nearly 20% in the fourth quarter
led the Fed to signal a pause in early 2019. Oil fell from over $75 a barrel in
October to below $50 by December, which pulled headline inflation lower going
into the next year.
MLA: “Inflation from 1947 to 2018: $100 is worth $1,126 today.” InflationCalculator.com, U.S. Bureau of Labor Statistics CPI-U data, https://inflationcalculator.com/inflation/1947-to-2018/
APA: InflationCalculator.com. Inflation from 1947 to 2018. Based on U.S. Bureau of Labor Statistics CPI-U data. Retrieved from https://inflationcalculator.com/inflation/1947-to-2018/