The Real Reason Politicians Can’t Fix the Affordability Crisis

The only thing rising faster than prices right now is everyone’s blood pressure when they check out at the register. Everything costs more. Not just “a little more.” We’re in a full-blown affordability crisis.

Across the country, the essentials of everyday life now feel like luxuries. Food prices are now more than 18% higher than they were in early 2022. Housing is even worse: a typical buyer now needs to earn about $121,400 a year to afford a median-priced home, while the average worker makes around $84,000. Then there’s child care, which now costs about $13,128 a year on average, up roughly 30% since 2020. More than 100 million adults (about 41% of the country) are carrying medical debt they can’t pay. Add in utilities averaging $265 a month, up 12% in a single year, and even keeping the lights on has become a monthly stress test. 

So it’s no surprise that 56% of Americans say the affordability crisis is their top concern. 

Democrats and Republicans may argue about who’s to blame, but they’re often describing the same lived reality: life costs too much and paychecks haven’t kept up.

Let’s look at how the affordability crisis got this bad and why the usual partisan talking points keep us stuck.

Democrats say the game is rigged

Democrats tend to see today’s affordability crisis as a system tilted in favor of the biggest players. 

From this perspective, housing is expensive because large investors can outbid families and local zoning rules prevent affordable housing. 

Healthcare costs soar because massive hospital systems and insurers can set prices as high as they want without government intervention. 

And grocery prices reflect corporate greed, with just a handful of megabrands controlling the vast majority of the food supply. 

The Democratic response flows from that diagnosis: crack down on monopolies, increase government assistance for housing, healthcare, and childcare, raise the minimum wage, cap drug prices, and cancel student debt.

Republicans say the government broke the machine

Republicans look at the same affordability squeeze and trace it back to a different culprit: too much government in the engine room of the economy. 

From this perspective, housing is expensive because zoning rules make it painfully slow and costly to build. 

Energy costs climb because environmental regulations restrict supply. 

Food gets pricier because inflation (fueled by heavy government spending) drives up transportation, labor, and production costs. 

And wages lag because jobs get shipped overseas for cheaper labor and business taxes eat into what could trickle down to workers. 

The Republican playbook flows straight from that diagnosis: cut taxes so people keep more of what they earn, roll back regulations to speed up housing, energy, and business expansion, rein in government spending to cool inflation, and trust competition to drive prices down faster than any bureaucracy ever could. 

Citizens from both parties agree on solutions—why can’t politicians?

Despite these differences, there’s a striking amount of agreement on what citizens actually want.

Across parties, voters agree on making healthcare prices transparent, lowering drug costs, breaking up monopolies, and making it easier to build more homes (even in their own backyards).

So why does progress feel impossible?

Because our political incentive structure rewards conflict and punishes cooperation. For a politician whose primary goal is reelection, outrage at the other side is one of the most powerful tools on their belt. Outrage drives fundraising. Division mobilizes bases. And actually solving problems drains the fuel that keeps political campaigns running. 

On top of that, if a Republican publicly supports a policy branded as “liberal,” such as Medicaid expansion, it can be framed as a betrayal by their base. If a Democrat backs something labeled “conservative,” such as opposing H-1B visas that notoriously underpay employees, the same thing happens on their side. That makes their seat an easy target for a primary challenger—someone eager to prove they’d never “cave to the other side.”

At the same time, big industries hire armies of lobbyists, donate to campaigns, and fund political groups to shape laws and regulations in their favor—even if those laws aren’t great for the public. Powerful companies in healthcare, housing, pharmaceuticals, and insurance consistently resist reforms that threaten profits.

And the media ecosystem often amplifies what inflames rather than what unites, making bipartisan agreement seem rarer than it really is. 

Bottom Line

Democrats are trying to protect people from powerful systems. Republicans are trying to protect people from powerful government. Most Americans just want protection from financial free-fall.

And until leaders start treating affordability like a shared crisis instead of a partisan weapon, families will keep doing what they’re doing now: budgeting harder, stressing more, and wondering how a country this wealthy made survival feel this expensive.

The good news? The solutions already overlap more than the politics suggests. What we need now is for our elected leaders to work toward the shared goals most Americans already agree on.

—Alex Buscemi (abuscemi@buildersmovement.org)

Art by Matthew Lewis