The establishment media is going after JD Vance for saying out loud at the Vice-Presidential debate that migration raises Americans’ housing prices.
But they’re distorting his argument, moving the goalposts, changing the subject, and downplaying their tacit admissions that migration does drive up Americans’ housing costs.
Their evasion and obfuscation is likely intended to defend Democrats from Vance’s politically powerful charge that President Joe Biden’s mass migration policy has pushed middle-class and young Americans out of homes to help make room for more illegal migrants.
“In the world according to JD Vance, immigrants are the root of all evil,” New York Times economist Paul Krugman sneered on October 3. “Still, immigrants are people, and people need housing,” he wrote before showing a graphic that portrays a four percent price increase as a nine percent drop.
What did Vance say at the presidential debate?
Look, in Springfield, Ohio, and communities all across this country — you’ve got schools that are overwhelmed, you’ve got hospitals that are overwhelmed, you’ve got housing that is totally unaffordable because we brought in millions of illegal immigrants to compete with Americans for scarce homes … We don’t want to blame immigrants for higher housing prices, but we do want to blame Kamala Harris for letting in millions of illegal aliens into this country, which does drive up costs higher … Twenty-five million illegal aliens competing with Americans for scarce homes is one of the most significant drivers of home prices.
Since 2021, Biden’s deputies have imported roughly 10 million migrants via legal, illegal, quasi-legal, and temporary migration routes. That is a huge shock to housing demand and prices wherever the migrants settle.
The Los Angeles Times and Sacramento Bee recognized Vance’s “one of the most significant drivers” statement but changed the subject by saying the 37 percent nationwide increase in housing prices was caused by a shortage of houses — as if the government-invited migration had no impact on the shortage.
“There is reason to doubt that immigration flows are the primary driver of housing unaffordability,” said DC-based Axios before admitting that migration does play a role in driving costs: “Patterns point to factors like long-term housing supply, pandemic-induced demand, and fiscal and monetary policies being bigger drivers of home prices than immigration flows.”
Back in September 2023, Axios quoted many city officials who recognized that migration creates housing shortages; “When populations feel pitted against one another, [New York City Comptroller Brad] Lander says, ‘you can wind up stoking flames that can be dangerous … I think there’s a real risk that the flames of xenophobia get fanned.'”
The Washington Post said Vance admitted that migrants raise housing prices, but declared “other forces have played a much bigger role in driving up prices.” The statement “a much bigger role” is a tacit admission that migration does raise housing prices.
NBC News moved the goalposts, saying“In general, economists are skeptical that immigrants are the main driver of the current predicament,” tacitly acknowledging that migration is one driver of housing costs.
The article then changed the subject to federal aid by quoting the city manager of Springfield Ohio, which has been hard-hit by the arrival of 20,000 migrants: “Without further support at the Federal level, communities like Springfield are set up to fail in being able to meet the housing needs of its residents,”
The NBC article did mention a study by the pro-migration Cato Institute, but it hid the study’s topline: “JD Vance Is Correct: Immigration Increases Housing Prices, and That’s Okay.” The Cato study said:Bringing the discussion back to Springfield, Ohio, where Vance started, housing prices have increased there as more Haitian migrants have moved in. According to Redfin, the median sale price of a single-family home sold there increased from $78,500 in August 2019 to $158,000 in August 2024, a 101 percent increase in nominal terms. The nationwide increase was 46 percent in nominal terms during the same period. That has made renters and first-time home buyers worse off in Springfield and homeowners, who are mostly native-born, better off.
“Vance is exaggerating — but he has a point,” said a Politico report which quoted a top economist from Barack Obama’s administration:
“Immigrants do actually drive up the value of houses, but it’s also the case that it only explains a small fraction of the increase we’ve seen in recent years,” [Jason Furman] added. “JD Vance is getting the sign right and the magnitude wrong.”
Some media outlets also downplayed the political issue by diverting the subject to rents — even though rents also push up housing prices.
Poor migrants “are not competing for the same households as middle-class Americans,” one pro-migration advocate told the Post.
Migration cannot have raised housing prices because migrants pay rents, Redfin Chief Economist Daryl Fairweather told Politico.
But rising rents are more housing costs for Americans — and also create incentives for landlords to pay higher prices for middle-class family homes before profitably converting them into rent-sharing apartments for many more poor migrants.
Politico quoted a September 2024 study by Moody’s Analytics saying that both rents and housing prices drop when migrants leave:
In terms of housing demand, immigrants, particularly newcomers, make up a significant portion of renter households. A considerable reduction in this population could greatly reduce housing demand, predominantly impacting the multifamily market and putting downward pressure on rent. While larger metropolitan areas with substantial immigrant population might experience the immediate impact, the subsequent effects could alter supply and demand dynamics across multiple urban and suburban communities.
The Moody’s report noted:
Nationally, the asking rent is now 20% above its pre-pandemic levels. Consequently, more than half (51.8%) of all renters allocate over 30% of their income to rent and utilities, with a significant majority being classified as severely rent-burdened or facing a rent-to-income ratio (RTI) exceeding 50%.
The Moody’s report is a credible admission against interest because Moody’s top leadership opposed Donald Trump in 2016 because his promised migration cutbacks would reduce housing values.
Overall, nearly all housing experts — although not Democratic politicians — recognize that migrants need housing and will raise prices as they compete against Americans.
“Immigration inflows into a particular MSA [Metropolitan Statistical Area] is associated with increases in rents and with house prices,” said a March 2017 article in the Journal of Housing Economics.
Worse, the “circumstantial evidence suggests that an inflow of immigrants into a particular MSA generates native out-migration into neighboring MSAs,” the report said. That middle-class flight has a big impact on housing prices in non-diverse school districts with few migrants.
Politico cited a January 2024 report about migration’s impact, which said: “Our estimates suggest that, on average, a one percentage point increase in the immigrant share of the local population raises house price appreciation by approximately 7 percent.”
However, many countries that have imported migrants have precipitated housing crises: “More dramatic price findings are reported by Gonzalez and Ortega (2013) who conclude that immigration to Spain in the previous decade was responsible for a 52% increase in housing values,” the Journal article noted.
In July, for example, Canadian Prime Minister Justin Trudeau admitted that a generation of young Canadians will be denied housing wealth because they cannot buy their way into the nation’s migration-inflated housing market: “They’re not going to get the same kind of homebuyers’ plan, necessarily, that people a generation ago did in terms of what the retirement nest egg would be.”
