As James Carville pointed out: "It's the economy stupid!"

Well, the economy is once again in the limelight under the rubric 'Affordability'.

Everyone but the rich is concerned with the high costs of living.

Housing, energy, healthcare and food top the list.

Unfortunately, most of the proposals for addressing the problem will either prove useless or exacerbate it.

The cause of the high prices of these necessities is our own government.

Let's take housing for example. The reason housing is so expensive is because government, federal, state and local suppresses supply by means of zoning laws, taxes and regulation. 

If these restrictions were lifted, developers would build the housing units necessary and prices would drop dramatically. 

As Henry David Thoreau noted:   "There are a thousand hacking at the branches of evil to one who is striking at the root."

Government is the root.