President Trump recently floated the idea of introducing 50-year mortgages to combat the housing crisis. Following a rough election for Republicans and a general consensus that the cost of living remains the top issue animating voters, this was clearly an underbaked attempt at pivoting ahead of the midterms. But stretching out the debt horizon won’t fix a system engineered over decades to inflate prices, transforming housing from a place to live into a high-risk, leveraged investment. Ever since the federal government standardized the 30-year mortgage, every political intervention has pushed homeownership further out of reach for young Americans. That frustration is now feeding the rise of politicians like Zohran Mamdani, who promise radical “solutions” to problems the government created in the first place.