With just a few months left in the year, Congress must do its job and address the housing crisis.

According to recently released survey data by the U.S. Census Bureau, 43% of households earning $50,000 or less were spending over half of their income on rent. It’s a common rule of thumb that your housing cost should be no more than 30% of your gross income. But with rising housing costs and stagnant wages, that’s becoming more and more unachievable.

Right now, a full-time worker needs to earn $25.82 per hour to afford a modest, two-bedroom rental home and $21.25 per hour to afford a modest, one-bedroom rental home.

Click here to send a message to your senators and representative and demand they act!

Eviction rates are back to pre-pandemic levels, with Black people and Latino people disproportionately facing the highest rates. 13% of Black renters have faced the threat of eviction, which is nearly double the rate of white renters.

The affordable housing crisis has been exacerbated by the coronavirus pandemic and rising inflation. The time for Congress to act is now. We demand:

1. An expansion of housing vouchers to at least an additional 200,000 households.
2. Significant funding to preserve and operate public housing ($5.125 billion for the Public Housing Capital Fund, and $5.06 billion for the Public Housing Operating Fund).
3. $3.6 billion for HUD’s Homeless Assistance Grants program to address the needs of people experiencing homelessness.
4. $100 million for legal assistance to prevent evictions.
5. $300 million for the competitive tribal housing program, targeted to tribes with the greatest needs.

If Congress can afford to give billions of dollars in tax breaks to the wealthy and major corporations, they can certainly afford to house people living in the U.S.

Click here to send a message to your senators and representative and demand they act!