As we approach this year’s midterm elections, it is important to emphasize the role of need-based policy in campaigns. Along with voting rights, gender rights and labor rights, a key concept that defines the cause of the left in the United States is housing.
Housing is a fundamental need for human survival. Because it underpins a stable life, it must now be at the center of public campaigning for emerging popular movements across the country. In particular, the Democratic Socialists of America, as well as adjacent groups, must place greater emphasis on their “Housing for All” principle to broaden their public appeal and expand their influence in mainstream politics.
Housing needs little explanation to convey its importance to most people. Wherever we may live, our lives depend on having a roof over our heads — it’s that simple. However, the United States is a prime example in the developed world of a country that is not merely troubled, but plagued by its inability to provide housing for all.
The root of homelessness in the United States is the crisis of affordability. In many cases, people who become homeless either do not earn enough money from their jobs to cover the cost of rent or a mortgage, or outright cannot have a job because of a disability or illness that makes them unable to work.
At least on paper, the government has mechanisms and systems in place to help people find a place to live. In reality, these systems fall far short of what is sufficient, let alone what is decent. Shelters across the country are often reported for health violations, inadequately constructed spaces and lack of hygiene.
These issues come on top of the fact that for a decent portion of the unhoused population, access to such services is already difficult to navigate. Budget cuts to support groups, such as Housing First, turn the steep cliff one must climb to get support into a high wall that people cannot overcome. The lack of a way out through support and outreach later becomes a key reason for the connection between homelessness and crime, as people may turn to unlawful methods to survive.
The reason why housing must be the primary cause is because being unhoused in the United States has a cascading effect on the people experiencing it. The lack of a home means the lack of employment, which means the lack of healthcare and benefits tied to employment, which means the inability to access support that can pull someone out of homelessness.
Beyond homelessness, even having a place to live does not protect people from the housing crisis. Rising rents and mortgages, paired with a diminishing supply of affordable housing, create a financial trap for the middle and lower class. As larger portions of monthly wages go to housing, quality of life declines because people cannot afford healthcare, education or even the most basic pleasures of life.
Poverty driven by declining financial stability has historically fueled political radicalism. Historically, countries like Weimar Germany and Italy became victims of radicalism in part because housing crises created discontent across the nation, some scholars argue. Meanwhile, modern examples such as Greece, especially after the Great Recession, show that antidemocratic populism benefits from masses troubled by housing and affordability crises.
This makes housing, a frequent root cause of poverty, the key issue for the emerging American left, as the political establishment cannot make bold policy decisions on housing availability and affordability. Indeed, defending democratic systems requires addressing disillusionment, and housing is the most central issue today — for appealing to the broadest portion of the population.
Currently, the DSA lists “Housing for All” as one of their key policies. Their advocacy for rent control and investments in public housing shows the importance of housing as a political issue, but it needs stronger emphasis as a campaign priority. If DSA-endorsed candidates succeed this November, a broader public campaign on housing is necessary to make the current crises of affordability and availability a national issue.
Connections between housing, and its lack thereof, and other issues cascading from it like healthcare, crime, education and employment must be at the very heart of the modern left movement in the United States. As people become disillusioned with the country’s existing economic and political system, the movement’s activists and leaders must provide a tangible, material cause to rally behind. That cause, that unifying and universal issue out of which all other issues stem in this country, is housing, and the American left must seize the opportunity to use it for their public outreach.
I sense that both Zohran Mamdani’s victory in New York City, as well as the expected successes for other popular candidates this November, are only the beginning of a new leftist movement that has the capacity to affect the “mainstream” of national politics. If this is truly the case, then to broaden the appeal of its other policies and causes, today’s leftists must put housing first and advocate more frequently and more broadly for housing as a guaranteed right for Americans everywhere.
Deniz Gulay is a senior double-majoring in history and Russian.
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