A house? Fuhgeddaboudit!
In 1981, half of 29-year-old Americans owned a house. As recently as 2021, the median age of a first-time home buyer was 33. In 2025, it has reached 40. Superficially, the reason is straightforward. Both the purchase price of a house and the cost of a mortgage have significantly increased.
The National Association of Realtors reports the median price of an existing home currently stands at $415,200 — up more than 50% since 2019. At the same time, mortgage rates are roughly twice as high as they were in late 2021.
This delay in buying real estate has reduced young Americans’ ability to amass wealth. The NAR warned that the loss of a decade of homeownership could cost Americans roughly $150,000 in equity on a typical starter home. This loss of prosperity continues a 45-year-long trend in the US.
45 years of ensuring the rich are spared distress
Since 1981, the year Reagan first argued that the proper role of the Republican Party was to ensure the rich did not suffer, wealth has flowed upwards in America. Not that he put it that way. He declared that giving more money to the rich would grow everyone’s nest egg.
Economists called it supply-side economics. The media christened it “trickle-down” economics. Reagan’s VP, George HW Bush, called it “voodoo” economics. But Reagan’s economic rose by any name smells equally rank.
Disastrously for the economic progress of the majority of Americans, enough voters continued to give Republicans the votes they needed to roll out more of the same. In 2001, George W Bush inflicted the Economic Growth and Tax Reconciliation Act on Americans. In 2003, he doubled down with the Jobs and Growth Tax Relief Reconciliation Act.
In 2017, Trump piled on with the Tax Cuts and Jobs Act. He also doubled down in 2025 with the One Big Beautiful Bill Act. The effect of all these bills has been two-fold. The national debt has risen sharply, with no evidence that these laws have led to sustained job growth. And most Americans have not realized any economic benefit.
Even the stock markets have performed better under Democratic administrations. The charts below show how the Dow has performed under each presidency since 1981. The pattern is robust.
A rising economic tide that has lifted only super-yachts
However, there is one select group of Americans who have continued to coin it without breaking a sweat. In 1982, the first year Forbes published its list of the wealthiest Americans, shipping tycoon Daniel K Ludwig was the richest American with a fortune estimated at $2 billion. Taking inflation into account, Ludwig, who died in 1992, would have been worth just under $9 billion in 2025 dollars. That net worth would put him at 149th place on the current Forbes list.
Elon Musk is currently the richest American with a fortune estimated at $428 billion. This increase means the inflation-adjusted wealth of the richest American has multiplied by 46. A multiple that the average American can only imagine. And Musk’s fellow multi-billionaires are breathing the same rarified financial air.
In the same time frame, the nominal median household income in the US has gone from $23,430 in 1982 to $83,730 in 2024. Had the median income kept pace with inflation, it would be almost $105,000 today. In effect, the purchasing power of the average American had declined 20%.
Where are the Democrats?
Given the stats, the Democratic Party’s inability to make political hay is a self-inflicted wound and a catastrophe for the country. Is their ineffectiveness due to incompetence, stupidity, failure to message, or fear? Even when they do the right thing — see Biden’s 2021 Infrastructure Investment and Jobs Act — they don’t get credit for it.
Regrettably, the Party has done nothing to improve its lot. Many claim to know what ails it. The center-left position is that there has been too much focus on identity and not enough on economics. The far left maintains that the Party is too centrist on the issues.
This rift is evidenced by the Party’s refusal to endorse democratic socialist Zohran Mamdani for NYC Mayor. While at the same time, a radical faction maintains the fiction that a vote for a centrist Democrat is the same as voting for a Republican.
It is a self-destructive civil war. Neither side will get anything they want if the so-called ‘pragmatists’ and ‘purists’ can’t understand that the biggest enemy is the opposition, not their teammates. It shouldn’t be that hard. On the one hand, everyone, no matter their demographic, wants equal respect and opportunity. And on the other hand, everyone, regardless of their demographic, wants economic security and opportunity.
When people share a common goal, the only reason they fight each other is that they fail to recognize it. The Party needs leaders who can both accept that truth and point it out.
