By A Two-To-One Margin, Voters Say Middle-Class Life Out Of Reach For Most Americans
What is the affordability crisis all about?
Is it just a new buzzword for longstanding economic discontent? Is it a mirage, with Americans living better than ever but in shock at high prices? Or is there something the usual economic data is missing?
The latest New York Times/Siena University poll doesn’t definitively answer these questions, but it offers some important clues. Most of all, it suggests that “affordability” is about the rising price of entry for a middle-class life: buying a home; paying for child care, college and health care; saving for retirement, and so on.
By a two-to-one margin, voters say a middle-class life is out of reach for most Americans. Whether voters are being realistic or not, their expectations aren’t being met: A majority say they can’t afford the life they think they ought to be able to afford. With numbers like these, it’s easy to see why affordability is poised to be one of the big issues in the midterm campaign.