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Democrats Want Credit for Affordability. Here Are the Bills They Actually Sent You.

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You Want to Run on Affordability? Okay. Let’s Look at the Tab.

I’ve seen a lot of nerve in my years watching Washington and Wall Street operate. But Democrats positioning themselves as the party of affordability might be the boldest con I’ve witnessed in recent memory. Not because Republicans are saints. They’re not. I’ll get to them. But if you’re going to stand up and claim the affordability mantle, you need to be able to survive contact with your own record. And this record is a disaster.

Bill Parcells said it best. You are what your record says you are. So let’s look at the record.

$1.9 Trillion and a Fed That Played Along

The Biden administration pushed through a $1.9 trillion COVID rescue package that was, by most honest economic assessments, completely unnecessary. The economy was already recovering. But the money went out the door anyway. And the Federal Reserve, the supposed independent guardians of monetary stability, looked at all of it and said sure, we’ll print money for that.

The result:

  • 5% average annual inflation during the Biden years
  • Consumer prices that rose and stayed risen. The inflation rate came down. The prices did not.
  • A working class that watched every dollar they earned buy less and less while being told the economy was strong
  • Then the cherry on top: they called it transitory

Transitory. Right. Ask anyone buying groceries how transitory it feels.

And before the partisan crowd comes at me, Trump’s COVID spending lit this fuse too. Both parties decided your purchasing power was a fair price to pay for their political moment. I called it out then. I’m calling it out now.

The Housing Math That Should Make You Furious

Affordable housing is a perfect case study in how government programs produce the exact opposite of their stated goals. Here is what happens when you subsidize demand without fixing supply. Prices go up. Every time. Without exception.

The numbers from California are not a typo. Affordable housing projects there cost more than $1 million per unit. One million dollars. Per unit. For affordable housing.

It costs 2.8 times as much to build an apartment in California as it does in Texas. Wage mandates, regulatory layers, permitting nightmares. All of it stacks on top of each other and then politicians hold press conferences about the housing crisis as if they had nothing to do with creating it.

Meanwhile, people who can afford to leave blue states did leave, which created supply-demand shocks in the markets they moved to. More policy consequences rippling through the economy while the people who caused them campaign on fixing it.

The Electricity Bill Comparison That Ends the Debate

Want to know what energy policy actually looks like in practice? Look at your electricity bill. Here are the actual residential retail electricity rates across the country right now:

  • California: 33.6 cents per kilowatt hour
  • Massachusetts: 30.5 cents per kilowatt hour
  • New York: 29.9 cents per kilowatt hour
  • Rhode Island: 28.3 cents per kilowatt hour
  • New Jersey: 25.2 cents per kilowatt hour
  • Florida: 15 cents per kilowatt hour
  • Nebraska: 13.8 cents per kilowatt hour
  • Tennessee: 13.7 cents per kilowatt hour
  • Utah: 13.1 cents per kilowatt hour

That spread is not random. It is the direct result of blocking pipelines, restricting drilling, shutting down nuclear plants, and layering CAFE standards onto the auto industry that drive up the cost of every vehicle on the lot.

You think there’s a green energy agenda behind those California rates? Of course there is. And working families pay for it every single month while politicians collect campaign donations from the right interest groups.

The Bottom Line Nobody in Politics Will Say Out Loud

Both parties have contributed to the affordability crisis that is crushing American households right now. The difference is at least one side isn’t currently trying to take a victory lap over it. The consumer class in this country deserves honesty, not campaign slogans built on a record of failure. I’ll keep giving you the numbers. You decide what to do with them.

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