> $1 in 1938 → $18.24 in 2019

https://www.in2013dollars.com/us/inflation/1938?amount=1

> "Despite the Depression, and a cover price of $1 in an era when the Sunday New York Times cost five cents, Fortune was an immediate success. It debuted in February 1930 with 30,000 subscribers and by 1937 it had a circulation of 460,000, with annual profits of half a million dollars..." source: https://www.peterharrington.co.uk/blog/fortune/

Today a copy costs $5.99, or $29.98 a year (source: https://www.magazine.store/fortune/)

TFA, second sentence in, says it is the 2014 equivalent to $174. I imagine those reading Fortune at the time could readily scrape together $174/year, depression or not.