A new report has found that the cost of rent has become so out of control that nearly half of renters in the country can no longer afford to make their payments. And to make things worse, virtually nothing is being done to solve this growing problem. Mike Papantonio & Farron Cousins discuss more.
Transcript:
*This transcript was generated by a third-party transcription software company, so please excuse any typos.
Mike Papantonio: A new report has found that the cost of rent has become so outta control that nearly half of the renters in this country can no longer afford to make their payments and to make things worse, virtually nothing is being done to solve the problem. We’re talking about rents that have gone up two and three times just in the last 24 months. And so somebody who’s day one, they’re paying $700, all of a sudden is paying 16, $1,700, along with having to make, they’ve got utility issues, they got inflation issues. They’ve got wrenching decisions that they have to make. Do I pay my rent? Do I pay my bills? Do I run the risk of being evicted? Can I pay just half rent? You don’t realize this until you’re in the middle of it. But you hear these stories, and right now I don’t see any way it’s turning around. I don’t see anything in the horizon that’s gonna turn this around.
Farron Cousins: No. There is not a single piece of legislation being proposed. Not a single piece of legislation pending. There’s not even really discussion of this from our leaders in Washington DC on either side of the aisle. This has been a problem that we have talked about before. It’s been a problem that even the most corporate of news outlets have talked about. And nobody is doing a thing about this. These people are telling, in this new report, saying, listen, after I pay my rent for this apartment or this rental house I’ve been in for five years, I pay my rent, I have less than $300 for the rest of the month to buy food for my children, to buy gas for my car. I cannot sustain this for more than a few more months before I’m out in the street. And here’s what gets me too. This report says the housing market’s telling us, well, it’s because there’s a shortage. There is not a home shortage in the United States. We have more.
Mike Papantonio: That’s coming from the White House. They’re trying to defend themselves. It’s not our fault. It’s not our fault there’s a housing shortage. That’s complete BS.
Farron Cousins: We have more vacant homes than we have unhoused people in this country. We could give every one of them a free house and we wouldn’t even notice.
Mike Papantonio: So you’ve got a homeless rate that hits a historical high. I saw an article coming outta San Francisco where a family of four, think about this, a family of four needs more than $200,000 a year just to live, have a place to live and pay their bills. $200,000. So it’s not just, first of all, it’s not a housing shortage. What is happening though, that’s part of this story, is Wall Street’s coming in and buying up big swaths of entire neighborhoods. And those used to be single family type homes that a young couple could buy. Now the prices are just so outrageous because corporate America’s involved and there’s no controls over it. There are executive, there are things from the executive level that can be done to stop this. But nothing’s being done. Now, when Wall Street gets involved, the media has already dropped the ball. You can’t even find these articles in the media. When Wall Street’s involved and they own everything, these stories are going to disappear because Wall Street’s gonna be paying advertising on MSNBC and CNN and ABC. They’re gonna control the networks just like they do with everything else, buy advertising dollars.
Farron Cousins: Yeah. And not to mention, a lot of these Wall Street executives also sit on the boards of directors for the media companies.
Mike Papantonio: Yes.
Farron Cousins: So they literally get to control what’s happening at these places. And again, the part that drives me crazy is that there’s nothing, nothing at all being done about this. And this, we see these stories about, oh, look at the economy. It’s doing great. We added more jobs than ever. The stock market’s doing better than ever. Listen, get down to the nitty gritty of it and you’re gonna see how bad people are doing in this country.
Mike Papantonio: There’s something called rent control. Okay. People know that term. And right now you have a White House who’s not trying to get at least Democratic governors to say, you have the right to do this, but nothing’s being done. Because you know what? It’s just because the media, it’s a sleeper story. It’s a sleeper story. They won’t do their job as usual.
