With the 2026 midterm elections approaching, congressional Republicans have limited time to address the mounting affordability crisis. As the cost of living ranks as the top issue on voters’ minds, the midterm elections risk becoming a referendum on pocketbook pressures.
Women, the largest voting bloc in the country, are particularly attuned to these challenges. That’s why the Washington Examiner partnered with Independent Women this week for an op-ed series, Reclaiming Affordability, featuring policy experts with realistic solutions.
Each day this week, experts from Independent Women examined the crisis from fresh angles — covering housing, energy, healthcare, child care, and elderly care — leaving no major driver of household costs unexplored. The groundwork is laid. Now it’s up to policymakers to deliver.
AMERICA’S AFFORDABILITY CRISIS IS A HOUSING SHORTAGE. WE CAN FIX IT IN THREE STEPS
Below you will find excerpts from each op-ed in the series, followed by a link to read each piece in its entirety.
Reasonable cost of living is on women’s minds. Here’s how to deliver it
Affordability is top of mind for women, especially those who are responsible for other family members. In most households, women make the spending decisions — from groceries to housing to children’s extracurricular activities. They are most concerned about affording housing, healthcare, and other basic needs such as utilities. According to a New York Times survey, 70% of women think a middle-class lifestyle is out of reach for most Americans, and 40% of women think the life they should be able to afford is out of reach for them.
In recent years, what used to be considered a normal lifestyle has become unaffordable. A quarter of American households live paycheck to paycheck, and only 47% of Americans can cover an emergency expense. Current generations are paying more of their income than ever to afford necessities such as housing and education. In a rapidly changing world, policies that support affordability are more important than ever.
Policymakers need to focus on creative housing solutions, reliable energy grids, transparent healthcare, and flexible work options that enable caring for children or elderly parents. Fortunately, these policies exist, as detailed in a new report, Reclaiming Affordability. The Trump administration is already moving the needle by increasing take-home pay and cutting taxes through the Working Families Tax Cuts, also known as the One Big, Beautiful Bill Act.
Affordability concerns will not go away with subsidies and cronyism; the status quo will only worsen the cost of living for women. However, free-market policies that reduce regulations, business costs, and tax burdens will increase the supply of services and goods we need at prices we can afford.
Kamryn Crane is a Budget and Entitlement Policy Analyst at Independent Women.
Click here to read Crane’s full op-ed.
A housing agenda that will move women forward
All issues are women’s issues, but no issue is more important today to the largest voting bloc than housing. Women want affordable housing — whether a first apartment after college, a starter home to begin a family, or a place to age with dignity. We have arrived at the moment for policymakers to address the structural challenges that have restricted housing supply and made housing so expensive.
Here is a road map to get it done. The government at every level must enact sweeping deregulation. Tinkering around the edges is not enough. The federal government must eliminate costly federal regulations that impact home building, zoning, financing, and permitting. Congress should also repeal the climate-change mandates on appliances that traded consumer preferences for high prices. In addition, Washington should incentivize states and local governments to enact needed zoning and permitting reforms. The ROAD to Housing Act, passed by the U.S. Senate last week, and the House’s version, are just the kind of packaged reforms that can spur the development of single-family and multi-family homes. We look forward to both chambers removing counterproductive elements of the package to ensure a strong deregulatory outcome.
Increasing the stock of multifamily properties is especially important to women. Many women desire multigenerational living so they can age in place with caregivers. Others value the opportunity to build income security in their later years by renting out spaces in their homes, such as finished basements (also known as accessory dwelling units or ADUs).
Finally, Congress should flex its taxing power to reduce inflation-driven tax penalties on home selling. Rising home prices boost homeowners’ portfolio values, but high inflation has unfairly padded their tax liabilities when it comes time to sell their homes. For decades, Congress has excluded from taxation up to $250,000 of the capital gain for individuals ($500,000 for married couples) on the sale of a primary residence. After 40 years, the exemption levels are outdated and should, at a minimum, be indexed for inflation. This breaks the lock-in effect for homeowners in single-family homes.
Patrice Onwuka is vice president of economic policy and director of the Center for Economic Opportunity at Independent Women and a co-host of WMAL-DC’s O’Connor & Co.
Click here to read Onwuka’s full op-ed.
State-level Green New Deals invite higher energy bills
Energy affordability is a top issue for women nationwide. Although data centers are blamed for raising our utility bills, states’ Green New Deal-esque plans deserve more scrutiny. Virginia is Exhibit A.
States that implemented aggressive renewable energy plans are seeing higher energy costs, pushing blue state governors in the Northeast, for instance, to quietly water down or eliminate these mandates.
THE DEMOCRATS’ EMPTY AFFORDABILITY PROMISES
And that’s what happened in Virginia. The Virginia Clean Economy Act, enacted in 2020, mandates that the state’s largest utility transition to 100% carbon-free electricity by 2045 and to build out the Coastal Virginia Offshore Wind project. Similar legislation in 2020 also mandated Virginia’s membership in the Regional Greenhouse Gas Initiative, a cap-and-trade program. The State Corporation Commission, the state agency that regulates utilities, warned that the VCEA would increase energy bills by $300 annually by 2030 and by $808 annually by 2050, respectively. The SCC analyzed the VCEA and predicted Dominion Energy utility bills would increase: Offshore wind buildout would add an additional $11 to $12 per month, solar buildout would increase bills $11 to $16 per month, and RGGI membership would add about $2.50 per month to each customer bill, respectively.
A tax-and-spend climate agenda won’t deliver reliability or affordability. Instead, repealing the VCEA while building new natural gas and nuclear power plants will bring actual relief.
Gabriella Hoffman is the director of the Independent Women’s Center for Energy and Conservation. Follow her on X at @Gabby_Hoffman.
Click here to read Hoffman’s full op-ed.
Want affordable healthcare? Put consumers in control
Americans have been told for years that the only way to make healthcare more affordable is to spend more government money and create more rules, but we all know this doesn’t work. Each year, we pay more in premiums, have higher deductibles, and find greater difficulty in getting the care we need. Our system has become a maze that seems nearly impossible to rein in or hold accountable. However, the solutions are surprisingly simple. Rather than funding a broken system, American households deserve policies that make the healthcare system easier to navigate and give them autonomy to find the best health coverage and care for their needs and budgets.
Today, we have a system that is incredibly opaque. There are so many layers of rules, middlemen, and administrative practices that make the system extremely frustrating to navigate as a patient, and nearly impossible for policymakers and the general public to hold accountable. Prices keep rising simply because they can, and no one has the leverage to push back.
So, what if the answer isn’t more of the same policies that add to the complexity? Instead, we should make simple changes that put consumers in control. Imagine knowing how much your care would cost before receiving it, and even comparing prices across doctors and facilities. Or picking an insurance plan that truly fits your preferences, not because it is offered by your employer or state. Transparency and flexibility would make it so our healthcare system works best for us — not the industry — and gives us the leverage we need to hold them accountable to lower prices.
If we want a healthcare system that is affordable and responsive to the people it serves, we must shift power away from the institutions that benefit from rising prices and toward the families who pay them. Policies that enact real transparency and choice would finally give Americans the ability to shop for care like they shop for everything else and take control of their budgets. These reforms aren’t complicated; they simply recognize that when consumers have control, competition increases and costs fall, making healthcare more affordable and sustainable.
Miranda Spindt is a healthcare policy analyst for Independent Women. Follow her on X @miranda_spindt.
Click here to read Spindt’s full op-ed.
The sandwich generation is being squeezed by the cost of care
Families who pay for child care now pay an average of more than $14,000 per year nationwide, with prices climbing even higher in many cities. In some communities, infant care rivals a monthly mortgage payment. Meanwhile, elder care costs are rising rapidly, too, as Americans live longer and the demand for in-home help grows.
For many families caught in the middle, the financial pressure can be overwhelming. Nearly 7 in 10 of sandwich-generation caregivers say helping aging parents is creating a serious financial strain. Many quietly draw down their savings to make sure both generations are taken care of.
DEREGULATE TO MAKE CHILDCARE AFFORDABLE AGAIN
There are innovative ideas worth exploring. Expanding the federal au pair program to include senior care placements, for example, and “American caregivers” could increase the supply of live-in caregivers while giving families more flexible options.
Flexible work can also be part of the solution. Millions of parents and caregivers rely on remote work, contract work, or flexible schedules to balance employment with caregiving responsibilities. Policies that restrict these opportunities can make it harder for families to manage care.
Heather Madden is vice president for policy initiatives at Independent Women.
Click here to read Madden’s full op-ed.