Stop almost anyone on the street today and you’ll hear we’re in a housing crisis. In most American counties, minimum-wage workers can’t afford to rent even a modest one-bedroom apartment. Working families are bidding against the world’s biggest financial firms for homes. On top of it all, people living in public housing complexes across the country are increasingly exposed to inhumane conditions after years of federal neglect and underinvestment.

It’s becoming nearly impossible for working-class people to buy and keep a roof over their heads. Congress must respond with a plan that matches the scale of this crisis.

For generations, the federal government’s approach to housing policy has been primarily focused on encouraging single-family homeownership and private investment in rental housing. The mortgage-interest deduction provides roughly $30 billion in tax write-offs to homeowners annually. In addition to their support of the mortgage market, Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac provide up to $150 billion in financial backing to the multifamily rental market every year, but much of it goes to large, corporate landlords. These lucrative loans come with very few tenant protections or labor requirements. And the largest affordable housing incentive our government offers — the low-income housing tax credit — too often ends up in the hands of for-profit developers.

Outsourcing development to the private market leaves affordable housing subject to the boom-and-bust cycle of private investment. What’s more, the federal government relinquishes the oversight needed to protect tenants from abusive landlords and racial discrimination.

The result is a housing market where corporate landlords make record profits while half of America’s 44 million renters struggle to pay rent. For a generation of young people, the idea of home has become loaded with anxiety; too many know they can’t find an affordable, stable place to rent, let alone buy.

Why is this happening? For decades, thanks to restrictive zoning laws and increasing construction costs, we simply haven’t built enough new housing.

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