During the February 4th State of Union our President told us “The affordability crisis is over.” Previously I have heard him repeatedly blame Democrats for the affordability crisis, often referring to it as a “hoax” “scam” or “con job” initiated by the Democratic Party.
Actually we do not have just one affordability crisis, we have two. The first is the traditional one of things costing more than we can afford to pay. The second is a lttle more complex but should be of even more concern. It revolves around the debt fueled government that our country is riding into oblivion.
Trump’s war of choice in Iran is going to make it all worse. His two bright spots, the gasoline prices and the stock market reacted negatively to the war with gas prices jumping over thirty cents per gallon and the Dow dropping 2,500 points from it 50,000 point level. It was the Dow’s worst week in almost a year. The DOW doesn’t mean much to the average person. It’s not even part of the affordability crisis.
The first affordability crisis boils down to more than what things cost, it is actually just as important to consider how much money we make so we can pay for what we need. I grew up in the fifties when for a short time I could still get a Coca-Cola and a pack of Nabs for a dime.
My single mother and I lived in small ranch house of 1732 square feet. Mother had it built for around $18,500. The house also had a small beauty shop on the back of it. From a very early age, I helped with the books. My memory tells me that mother never made more than $6,000 in a year. That actually was pretty good back in the fifties when the median household income was $4,400. She worked unbelievably long hours for her money.
If you adjust those 1950s dollars to 2026 dollars the house would be worth around $224,000. The same house recently sold for $325,000. It been converted completely to commercial use which probably added some to its value. It would be a small low cost home today in Lewisville but it has still gone up substantially in value.
When we moved back from the coast 2021, we determined we could not afford to live in Lewisville Property taxes are very high and the median home cost in Lewisville is over $450,000. Granted the homes are bigger and much fancier than our simple ranch of 1955, but the net is that we moved to a less expensive area which has not developed as rapidly as Lewisville.
Mother’s $6,000 earnings as a beautician translate to about $72,500 in 2026 dollars which is more than I made in my last year as an executive in a small company that built fiber networks. The average North Carolina hairdresser today makes $44,491 which is pretty close to what the median $4,400 household income would be in today’s dollars. However, it is over $28,000 less than the purchasing power of what my mother made in 1955.
Average ground beef prices in 1955 were 39 cents. For more perspective, in 1955, a 5-lb chuck roast cost about $1.45, and a gallon of milk was roughly 93 cents. The 39 cents for ground beef in 1955 translates to $4.72 today. The average price of ground chuck today is $6.50 but $1.43 of that price increase has happened in the last year because of the beef shortage, which is unique in the last forty plus years since I sold my cattle herd in 1982. So if the shortage increase is factored out we have $5.07 for a pound of beef compared to the inflation adjusted $4.72. I could continue this with more items like the average car which cost $3,000 in 1955 and would have an inflation adjusted price of $36,000 today. The true average cost today is over $49,000. Of course today’s average car is very different than our 1959 Chevrolet Impala which didn’t even have air conditioning, power steering, or electric windows.
The best information I can find is from the Economic Policy Institute which only goes through 2013. It shows when you look at the pace of annual pay increases, the top 1% wages grew 138% since 1979, while wages for the bottom 90% grew 15%.
As is often the case there are a lot of numbers out there, but I believe the pay that many workers receive today has not kept pace with their productivity and inflation. When you factor in some items like housing, cars, and scare beef, the affordability crisis is very serious and has not disappeared. I have seen some statistics showing recent college grads are making less than they did in 2000 which might explain why so many are living at home.
I can speak to personal experience of CEOs even in small businesses earning exorbitant salaries while very productive employees are paid far less than they are worth. Because of our healthcare swamp, employees are often reluctant to look for a higher paying job because they might lose their health insurance. We also live in an economy where older workers are ignored as potential employees in spite of having skill sets that dwarf many new hires.
During the period from 1965–1970s: the CEO to typical worker pay ratio was relatively stable, with CEOs earning approximately 20 to 30 times more than the typical worker. Today the ratio is 280 times the typical worker. The top 1% of households in the U.S. own 34.9% of the country’s wealth, compared to 22.6% in the UK and 18.6% in Germany. The U.S. middle class has shrunk from 61% of adults in 1971 to 51% in 2026, driven by income stagnation, rising costs, and technology and globalization.
The affordability crisis is real and getting worse because workers have less purchasing power than in previous years and some items like housing, cars, and healthcare have risen much faster than inflation while their paycheck have failed to keep up.
The second affordability crisis is our debt addicted government and if truth be told, the governments bears some responsibility for the first crisis by not addressing income equality and for continually cutting taxes for high income earners.
Since the start of the Iraq War in 2003, US national debt has increased from roughly $6.4 trillion to over $36 trillion by early 2025, driven heavily by war spending, major tax cuts (2001/2003/2017), recessionary response (2008), COVID (2020), and rising interest costs.
Since taking office in 2025, the current President has added another $2.25 trillion in debt. In fact for the first time in history the interest on the national debt costs the US taxpayer over $1 trillion dollars per year.
We are adding to the debt an average of $6.4 billion per day. The One Big Beautiful Bill will add another $3.4 trillion to $4.1 trillion to the debt. Those numbers do not count the war with Iran which most analysts believe is costing us $1 Billion dollars a day.
At least $1 trillion in that new debt comes directly from taxes cuts to richest 1% of Americans.
Much of our debt has come from debt funded wars. Since George W. Bush never sought funding for his wars after 9/11, we have spent $8 trillion dollars just on the fighting in the Middle East and that doesn’t count aid to Israel which is estimated at $7.8 billion just his year. In addition to the monetary debt the Middle East has caused enormous loss of life and suffering. From Google:
Total Deaths: An estimated 940,000 people were killed directly by violence in major war zones.
Indirect Deaths: An additional 3.6–3.8 million people likely died due to war-related diseases, hunger, and destroyed infrastructure.
Displacement: Approximately 37-38 million people were displaced from their homes in Afghanistan, Iraq, Pakistan, and elsewhere.
Civilian Toll: Over 432,000 civilians died directly from fighting.
U.S. Military Personnel: Over 7,057 U.S. service members died, with at least four times as many veterans dying by suicide.
Disabled Veterans: Roughly 1.8 million U.S. veterans have a recognized disability as a result of these conflicts. Many of these human costs also translate into monetary costs such as longterm care for our veterans.
So I ask you as we begin another unfunded war this time with Iran, a much tougher opponent which only became a threatening power after we destroyed Iraq and destabilized the region, how many more times can we afford to do this without raising taxes to pay for the war instead of adding to the debt that our children and grandchildren will face?
Not only are the wars with Venezuela and Iran unfunded, they have never been debated or approved by our representatives.
After George W. Bush invaded Iraq looking for non-existent weapons of mass destruction, many have argued the country is in worse shape because of the destruction and human suffering.
Killing Iran’s terribly repressive leaders is unlikely help the Iranian people find their way to less repressive government. Even so our intervention would have more helpful a few weeks ago when our President was urging them to revolt which they did and by all accounts, thousands died in the resulting crackdown.
I do not feel any safer because we decapitated Iran or Venezuela. Of course that might be because there are masked US government thugs wandering America’s streets, kidnapping people, holding them without due process and even murdering some with impunity.
I would like to see the developing Iranian war debated in Congress before the conflict gets too big to control. If Mike Johnson is incapable of calling on Congress to do that, he needs to resign. We also cannot afford a do-nothing Congress any longer.
In closing, if our 250 year old experiment in democracy is going to survive and thrive, we need a new social contract with workers. We need the rich and corporations to pay their fair share and to make sure workers are adequately rewarded.
Many of those who have gotten rich and the corporations that are now rolling in cash got there because of our money which helped them through government research that drove unparalleled innovation, the development of the Internet, a nationwide transportation network including airports that spans our country and a stable government. When you add an educated workforce, it is pretty clear these billionaires did not do it all on their own.
We ignore these affordability crises at our own peril.