$100 in 1948 is worth $110 in 1952,
because prices increased 10.0% over that period, an average of
2.40% a year.
$100 in 1948 has
the same buying power as
$110
in 1952
Detailed inflation statistics
Cumulative price change
10.0%
Average inflation rate
2.40% per year
Converted amount ($100 base)
$110
Price difference ($100 base)
$9.96
CPI in 1948
24.1
CPI in 1952
26.5
Inflation in 1948
8.07%
Inflation in 1952
1.92%
$100 in 1948 → 1952
$110
$100 in 1952 → 1948
$90.94
What happened to prices between 1948 and 1952
Between 1948 and 1952, the Consumer Price Index went from 24.1 to 26.5.
Cumulatively, prices increased 10.0%, which works out to an average of
2.40% per year. Put differently, a dollar in 1948 bought what
$0.91 buys in 1952: the 1948 dollar
lost 9.1% of its purchasing power over
these 4 years.
Consumer prices rose 8.1% in 1948, down slightly from 1947’s
14.4% but still the second straight year of sharp postwar inflation now
that wartime price controls were fully gone. Congress moved to stabilize a
different economy that April, passing the Economic Cooperation Act to fund
the plan Secretary of State George Marshall had proposed the year before:
more than $13 billion over four years to rebuild Western Europe and counter
Soviet influence. The Cold War turned tense closer to the plan’s target
that June, when Soviet forces cut off road and rail access to the
Western-controlled sectors of Berlin. American and British aircraft
responded almost immediately with an airlift of food, fuel, and supplies
that would keep the city running for nearly a year. Domestic politics
produced its own upset that November: nearly every poll and pundit had
predicted a Republican win, but Harry Truman defeated New York Governor
Thomas Dewey, handing the Chicago Tribune its famously wrong “Dewey Defeats
Truman” headline. Consumer prices finished the year 143.4% above their
1913 level and 40.9% above 1929’s
pre-Depression peak. First-class postage held at 3 cents, and the minimum
wage stayed at 40 cents an hour.
Every 1948 amount converts to 1952 at the same ratio, 1.10: $1,000 becomes
$1,100, and $10,000 becomes $10,996.
Amount in 1948
Value in 1952
$1.00
$1.10
$5.00
$5.50
$10.00
$11.00
$20.00
$21.99
$50.00
$54.98
$100
$110
$500
$550
$1,000
$1,100
$5,000
$5,498
$10,000
$10,996
$100,000
$109,959
$1,000,000
$1,099,585
Inflation by spending category, 1948–1952
Between 1948 and 1952, transportation rose the most, up 24.8%, while apparel rose the least, up 2.4%, against 10.0% for all items. The headline number is an average; here is what $100 of 1948
spending costs in 1952, by category:
Category
Avg. yearly inflation
$100 in 1948 →
All items (CPI-U)
2.40%
$110
Transportation
5.69%
$125
Medical care
3.77%
$116
Food
2.40%
$110
Apparel
0.58%
$102
Not shown because the BLS began these indexes after 1948: core (all items less food & energy) (1957–), energy (1957–), housing (1967–), recreation (1993–), education & communication (1993–).
Decade by decade: 1948 to 1952
Prices climbed fastest in the 1950s, averaging 4.86% a year, and slowest in the 1940s (0.00% a year). Each step below chains into the full 1948–1952 change:
Years
Avg. yearly inflation
Price change
$100 from 1948, at end
1948–1950
0.00%
0.0%
$100
1950–1952
4.86%
10.0%
$110
Year by year: CPI and the value of $100 from 1948
$100 from 1948 had already become $100 by
1950, on its way to $110 in 1952; each row shows the CPI, that
year's inflation rate, and the running value.
Within the span, inflation peaked at 7.9% in 1951, and prices fell 1.2% in 1949, the deepest deflation of the period.
In 1952, prices rose 1.9% and $100 from 1948 had the buying
power of $110; the year's average CPI of 26.5 is the level
behind every 1952 figure on this page.
Consumer prices rose 1.9% in 1952, down sharply from 1951’s
7.9% as the price and wage controls imposed the year before held the cost
of living in check even with the Korean War still underway. Labor strife
tested those controls that spring: to head off a strike that could have
disrupted war production, President Truman ordered the government to
seize the steel industry that April, over the objections of steel
companies fighting the price the Office of Price Stabilization had set for
their product. The Supreme Court ruled the seizure unconstitutional in
Youngstown Sheet & Tube Co. v. Sawyer that June, a landmark limit on
presidential power, and steelworkers then struck for 53 days before a
settlement. Politics delivered the year’s biggest change that November:
Dwight Eisenhower defeated Adlai Stevenson, promising to “go to Korea” to
end the war and returning Republicans to the White House for the first
time since 1933. The Cold War’s technological edge sharpened that same
month, when the United States tested the first hydrogen bomb at Enewetak
Atoll on November 1, a device hundreds of times more powerful than the
atomic bombs used against Japan in 1945. Consumer prices finished 1952
167.7% above their 1913 level. First-class postage held at
3 cents, and the minimum wage stayed at 75 cents an hour.
MLA: “Inflation from 1948 to 1952: $100 is worth $110 today.” InflationCalculator.com, U.S. Bureau of Labor Statistics CPI-U data, https://inflationcalculator.com/inflation/1948-to-1952/
APA: InflationCalculator.com. Inflation from 1948 to 1952. Based on U.S. Bureau of Labor Statistics CPI-U data. Retrieved from https://inflationcalculator.com/inflation/1948-to-1952/