$100 in 1952 is worth $113 in 1961,
because prices increased 12.8% over that period, an average of
1.35% a year.
$100 in 1952 has
the same buying power as
$113
in 1961
Detailed inflation statistics
Cumulative price change
12.8%
Average inflation rate
1.35% per year
Converted amount ($100 base)
$113
Price difference ($100 base)
$12.83
CPI in 1952
26.5
CPI in 1961
29.9
Inflation in 1952
1.92%
Inflation in 1961
1.01%
$100 in 1952 → 1961
$113
$100 in 1961 → 1952
$88.63
What happened to prices between 1952 and 1961
Between 1952 and 1961, the Consumer Price Index went from 26.5 to 29.9.
Cumulatively, prices increased 12.8%, which works out to an average of
1.35% per year. Put differently, a dollar in 1952 bought what
$0.89 buys in 1961: the 1952 dollar
lost 11.4% of its purchasing power over
these 9 years.
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.
Every 1952 amount converts to 1961 at the same ratio, 1.13: $1,000 becomes
$1,128, and $10,000 becomes $11,283.
Amount in 1952
Value in 1961
$1.00
$1.13
$5.00
$5.64
$10.00
$11.28
$20.00
$22.57
$50.00
$56.42
$100
$113
$500
$564
$1,000
$1,128
$5,000
$5,642
$10,000
$11,283
$100,000
$112,830
$1,000,000
$1,128,302
Inflation by spending category, 1952–1961
Between 1952 and 1961, medical care rose the most, up 37.1%, while food rose the least, up 5.9%, against 12.8% for all items. The headline number is an average; here is what $100 of 1952
spending costs in 1961, by category:
Category
Avg. yearly inflation
$100 in 1952 →
All items (CPI-U)
1.35%
$113
Medical care
3.57%
$137
Transportation
1.77%
$117
Apparel
0.65%
$106
Food
0.64%
$106
Not shown because the BLS began these indexes after 1952: core (all items less food & energy) (1957–), energy (1957–), housing (1967–), recreation (1993–), education & communication (1993–).
Decade by decade: 1952 to 1961
Prices climbed fastest in the 1950s, averaging 1.39% a year, and slowest in the 1960s (1.01% a year). Each step below chains into the full 1952–1961 change:
Years
Avg. yearly inflation
Price change
$100 from 1952, at end
1952–1960
1.39%
11.7%
$112
1960–1961
1.01%
1.0%
$113
Year by year: CPI and the value of $100 from 1952
$100 from 1952 had already become $103 by
1956, on its way to $113 in 1961; each row shows the CPI, that
year's inflation rate, and the running value.
Within the span, inflation peaked at 3.3% in 1957, and prices fell 0.4% in 1955, the deepest deflation of the period.
In 1961, prices rose 1.0% and $100 from 1952 had the buying
power of $113; the year's average CPI of 29.9 is the level
behind every 1961 figure on this page.
Consumer prices rose 1.0% in 1961, down from 1960’s 1.7% as
the economy climbed out of recession, a recovery the National Bureau of
Economic Research dates to that February. Politically, the year opened
with a changing of the guard: outgoing president Dwight Eisenhower’s
farewell address on January 17 warned of a growing “military-industrial
complex,” and three days later John F. Kennedy was sworn in, urging
Americans to “ask not what your country can do for you.” The new
administration’s first major foreign-policy test came quickly and badly:
a CIA-organized force of Cuban exiles landed at the Bay of Pigs on April
17 aiming to topple Fidel Castro, and without the U.S. air support Kennedy
withheld, the invasion collapsed within three days. Cold War tensions
hardened further that August, when East German forces sealed the border
between East and West Berlin overnight, building what would become the
Berlin Wall and stopping the flow of refugees to the West. Domestically,
the wage floor moved for the first time in five years: the Fair Labor
Standards Amendments of 1961, effective that September, raised the
minimum wage to $1.15 an hour and extended coverage to roughly 3.6 million
additional workers. Consumer prices finished 1961 202.0% above their
1913 level. First-class postage held at 4 cents.
MLA: “Inflation from 1952 to 1961: $100 is worth $113 today.” InflationCalculator.com, U.S. Bureau of Labor Statistics CPI-U data, https://inflationcalculator.com/inflation/1952-to-1961/
APA: InflationCalculator.com. Inflation from 1952 to 1961. Based on U.S. Bureau of Labor Statistics CPI-U data. Retrieved from https://inflationcalculator.com/inflation/1952-to-1961/