The Housing Debate Is Changing and We’re Not Letting Up
A major weekend for housing policy, a major month ahead for reform and a live Toronto event you won’t want to miss.
Highlights
In a speech on Saturday, the Prime Minister laid out his housing policy priorities, which included some MMI-favourites, such as development charge reductions, and highlighted the importance of “incessant” advocacy.
We’ll be launching a new feature and a new project this month to make further progress on pro-middle-class policy, including housing.
We’re hosting our first-ever live event on June 1 in Toronto. We hope to see you there!
A weekend of housing and middle-class economy policy
Think-tanks like the Missing Middle Initiative are a lot of fun, but they do come with their frustrations. One particular frustration is that trying to get governments to enact pro-middle-class reforms can feel like pushing a boulder up a hill, and when successes do happen, there is the attribution problem of connecting changes to anything your organization has done. Because of that, we look for any possible victory we can.
Over the weekend, the annual Global Progress Action Summit was held in Toronto. This year’s event, co-hosted by Canada 2020 and the Centre for American Progress, brought together wonks, political strategists, and politicians from around the world to discuss shared policy challenges.
The Missing Middle’s Founding Director, Mike Moffatt, is a regular attendee of these two-day events. On Friday, Mike moderated a panel featuring colleagues from Spain, Norway, Australia, and the Netherlands to share best practices on both inflation-reduction and housing-supply policies. The day ended with a gala hosted by Canada 2020, with former U.S. President Barack Obama headlining the evening, giving a fireside chat.
Saturday featured a series of speakers, including Pete Buttigieg, former Swedish Prime Minister Magdalena Andersson, and author Jonathan Haidt; the agenda and a full five-hour video are available online.
Prime Minister Mark Carney closed the event. Early in his 25-minute speech, the PM spoke about Canadian housing policy, including Build Canada Homes, and the importance of reducing taxes on home construction, including the HST and development charges. We’ve included the two-minute section on housing policy below, which is worth watching, as they indicate the federal government’s priorities when it comes to housing:
Video 1: May 9, 2026: Prime Minister Mark Carney on Canadian housing policy
The Prime Minister was kind enough to give MMI not just one, but two shout-outs, including our “incessant” discussion of development charges (DCs), in a light-hearted manner. While that word has negative connotations, we wear it with a badge of pride. Over the years, we’ve extensively studied DCs, written dozens of posts and op-eds, hundreds of tweets, made countless media and podcast appearances, and authored or co-authored several reports, including A Pathway to Development Charge Reform on the subject. At MMI, we’re big believers in the maxim “When you're tired of saying it, they're only just starting to hear it.” The biggest mistake think-tanks make is not repeating their message enough; there is no change without repetition.
We’re going to continue to be relentless in our efforts to enhance middle-class policy. When new family-sized homes are twice as expensive today relative to incomes as they were two decades ago, we have no choice but to keep fighting for policies to revive Canada’s urban middle class.
We also received a couple of nice shout-outs from the Finance Minister regarding affordability:
Video 2: May 9, 2026: Finance Minister François-Philippe Champagne on affordability
It is days like that which encourage us to keep pushing the boulder up the hill.
Launching a new feature and a new project
A few times over the weekend, we were asked if we had any “two-pagers” on some of our policy issues and recommendations, from development charges to zoning reform. A two-pager, in Canadian government-speak, is a short two-page briefing report on a particular subject that may include recommendations or possible courses of action.
Our short answer was, “No, but we really should!” So we will. We’ll release our first policy two-pager later this week; expect it to become a regular feature.
We’ll also be announcing a substantial new housing policy-related initiative later this month, in partnership with our Supporting Partners. Watch this space for details!
Come see us live in Toronto!
If you’re a fan of the Missing Middle podcast shows DemograFix and Classonomics (and we certainly hope you are), and you’re in the Toronto area, you’ll want to attend our first-ever live taping! We’re taking the show to the National Club, and inviting a special guest: Ron Butler, of the Angry Mortgage Podcast. We’ll be talking about everything from policy to politics to economics and the decline of the middle class, and taking your questions.
Space is limited, so get your tickets today! As well, we’re planning on taking the show on the road in the fall, so let us know if you’re interested in seeing us in your town.
Get your tickets at Eventbrite.
We hope to see you there!