Affordability Crisis Tests Who Pays for Policy

The POLITICO Poll found that 43% of Americans blamed Donald Trump more than Joe Biden for the economy, while 28% blamed Biden more than Trump. With November’s elections approaching, those figures put the cost of living at the center of a political test: voters will judge whether elected officials can deliver the improvements they promised. “26 Ideas for Solving the Affordability Crisis” examines proposals on tariffs, housing, taxes, food, health care, utilities and other costs. Working households face the consequences of decisions made by governments, regulators and businesses.

The costs behind the politics

Affordability has become a permanent concern in American politics, not simply a lingering effect of pandemic price shocks. Candidates who once avoided the subject now face pressure to make it a policy priority. The collection describes a shift: after the 2008 global financial crisis, voters saw themselves chiefly as homeowners, investors, savers and taxpayers. Later, amid industrial change and international competition, wage earners worried about jobs. Now consumers often judge energy, health care, education, housing and agriculture through the prices they pay.

Oren Cass, founder of the conservative think tank American Compass, argues that treating Americans chiefly as consumers fails to respect them as workers. Lina Khan, an antitrust advocate and adviser to New York Mayor Zohran Mamdani, has called for a broader view of markets. Amazon has lowered prices for many goods, but Khan and others say it did so at the expense of sellers and consumer choice.

Tariff decisions show how trade policy reaches household budgets. After Republican lawmakers and industries pressed him, President Donald Trump exempted some products from tariffs. Maine Sen. Susan Collins and Kansas Sen. Jerry Moran pressed for exemptions on road salt and cement to avoid higher construction costs. Officials also exempted bulk whiskey and liquor imports, refined lead, household paper products and low-voltage switchgear used in data-center construction.

After Chinese President Xi Jinping visited Washington in late September, the United States and China identified products worth around $30 billion on each side that could face future tariff reductions. Those products included toys, baby gear, kitchen appliances and linens from China, but officials hadn’t implemented the reductions. An analysis by the center-right American Action Forum found that the share of U.S. imports exempted from Trump’s tariffs rose from about 30% under the original “Liberation Day” duties to roughly two-thirds under tariffs imposed in July over forced-labor concerns.

Who bears the burden

The collection also warns that direct payments and tax cuts can raise prices and federal debt in the current economic climate. Higher federal borrowing costs can feed into mortgage and car-loan rates. The government now spends more on interest payments than on defense. Reducing deficits would require balancing taxes and benefits in programs such as Social Security and Medicare, but changes could also make necessities less affordable.

Housing proposals put public authority and local control in focus. Seattle Social Housing Developer, a public authority created through ballot initiatives, acquired the 150-unit Elara apartment complex. A 5% tax on employers paying individual workers more than $1 million annually funds the authority. Rents range from $665 for a low-income tenant in a studio to $3,767 for a two-bedroom apartment at market rates. Its interim CEO, Tiffani McCoy, said the model aims to keep properties publicly owned and protect them from market speculation. She said the authority plans to devote 50% of its new construction portfolio to family-sized homes.

The collection describes other approaches that keep decisions at state or local level. California’s CalRx program uses the state’s purchasing power to arrange lower-cost medicines through manufacturers. California says the program has saved more than $61 million on generic naloxone. In August 2026, it began supplying free emergency inhalers to every public and charter school in the state for three years. The program’s reach remains limited, Geoffrey Joyce, a senior scholar at USC Shaeffer, said: “admirable in its intent, but only a small part of the market will benefit.”

Private charity is also absorbing demand for basic needs. Rep. Blake Moore, a Utah Republican who launched the Congressional Philanthropy Caucus, said: “There is a gap with what the government can do. Our welfare programs are not going to solve everything. They never will.” Food banks reported demand exceeding what they experienced during the Covid-19 pandemic after a government shutdown cut off SNAP benefits to millions. Claire Neal, CEO of MANNA FoodBank in western North Carolina, said: “We’re seeing lots of folks who have never struggled before and never anticipated to be standing in line at a food pantry.”

Regulators and market power

Electric and gas utilities requested $18.6 billion in rate increases through the second quarter of the year, according to consumer advocacy group PowerLines. Utility commissioners set retail rates and oversee utility spending, including infrastructure for the AI boom. Governors and candidates have increasingly intervened in the debate. Pennsylvania Gov. Josh Shapiro threatened to withdraw the state from PJM Interconnection, a regional grid operator spanning 13 states, and urged price controls alongside President Donald Trump and a bipartisan group of governors.

Ticket prices offer another example of consumers facing concentrated market pressure. Massachusetts state Sen. Dylan Fernandes said $200 face-value tickets for singer Noah Kahan’s four-night Fenway Park run appeared on resale sites for thousands. His bill would cap resale prices at 110% of face value, limit fees and ban speculative ticket sales. In Washington, D.C., the council passed a law capping secondary-market prices at 120% of face value and banning ghost ticketing and surveillance pricing. The Ticket Policy Forum, which represents resale platforms including SeatGeek and StubHub, sued to block it.

The collection’s proposals range from tariff exemptions and public housing to tax credits and tighter rules for utilities and ticket resellers. The central political question isn’t whether affordability matters anymore. It’s which institutions will make the decisions, and whether their policies lower costs for working households.