cities have seen a decrease in low-cost rental units, with a total decrease of 4 million units between 2011 and 2018. Furthermore, federal housing policy has often prioritized homeownership over renting, such as spending approximately three times as much on mortgage-interest deduction than on housing vouchers. The United States also has a homelessness problem. According to a 2017 report, there were 553,742 homeless people in a given night in the United States, compared to 4,751 in the United Kingdom. According to 2019 data, the rate of homelessness has been on the rise for three years in a row, with a 3% increase that year. While homelessness has declined in some states, it has seen significant growth in other states, such as California, where it increased by 16.4% in 2019. Some activists and organizations, such as the National Alliance to End Homelessness, say that affordable housing is the solution to the homelessness crisis. Some politicians have advocated for the expansion of affordable housing. In 2010, Jimmy McMillan ran for governor of New York under the Rent Is Too Damn High Party. In 2019, Representative Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez said that affordable housing should be a "legislated human right." During the 2019-20 Democratic primaries, candidates such as Bernie Sanders and Kamala Harris discussed the right to affordable housing. Coronavirus pandemic During the coronavirus pandemic, a movement emerged to "cancel rent" in cities across the United States. Many people lost all of their income, or a substantial portion of their income. In response, a movement grew to cancel all rent payments for the duration of the health and economic crisis. Rationale Financial insecurity Activists argue that many tenants were in financially precarious situations before the pandemic. The economic impact of national shutdowns and social distancing has left people desperate. Before the coronavirus pandemic, only 47% of Americans had enough funds to cover three months of expenses. Two in five Americans and three in five renters could not pay for a $400 emergency, according to Federal Reserve data. Meanwhile, a large percentage of tenants were rent burdened, with 40.6% of rental residents spending at least 35% of their monthly household income on rent and utility bills, according to 2018 data provided by the United States Census Bureau. With the closures of businesses and orders to shelter-in-place, millions of people abruptly lost their jobs. In the first six weeks of the pandemic, 30 million people filed for