In recent years, housing has emerged as arguably the key driver of class divisions in the Western world. For decades, working- and middle-class people could dream reasonably about buying a house, providing security for their families and a financial nest egg for themselves, but that dream is now slowly dying. Until the Nineties, house prices generally rose at about the same rate as income, and homeownership became more widespread, with the median multiple in most areas around three. But since then, prices “have been three times faster than household median income over the last two decades”, according to the OECD.

This has been further confirmed by a new Demographia International Housing Affordability study which found that, despite claims that they reduce prices, higher urban population densities are associated with worse housing affordability in the United States, Australia and Britain. Many of these changes are due to urban containment or compact city strategies that seek to limit development in already urbanised areas and promote urban density — an approach widely popular with progressive activists.

Unfortunately, many of the drivers behind these trends are political: the embrace of pro-density policies has been commonplace in both the Barack Obama and Joe Biden administrations, as well as in progressive bastions such as California. Indeed, there are even attempts by the likes of Biden to transfer inner-city populations to suburbs, who may be less than welcome when they get there. Add to that the problem of high interest rates, the product of Washington’s extreme profligacy, and even more people are being driven out of the market.