When Dr. Martin Luther King Jr. traveled to Memphis in 1968 to support striking sanitation workers, he was simultaneously fighting against segregation and poverty.
King was explicit about the link between racial justice and economic survival, arguing that dignity meant little without the ability to afford basic necessities, such as food and housing. More than five decades later, that unfinished struggle echoes in cities like Houston, where rents now routinely approach or exceed $1,700 a month, placing intense strain on working families.
However, studios and one-bedrooms remain somewhat affordable.
As of December 2025:
- The average rent in Houston was $1,180 per month, 28% lower than the national average rent of $1,632/month.
- For two-bedroom apartments, the rent increases to $1,492, and for three-bedroom apartments, it is $1,900.
Still, the steady rise of Houston rents has frustrated renters.
Despite an increase in rental inventory, per the Houston Association of Realtors, the average lease price was $2,262, the lowest lease price since February 2025.
Meanwhile, the minimum wage in Houston has remained unchanged at $7.25 per hour since 2009, the same as the federal minimum wage.
“I don’t know what they expect people to do when $15 hourly jobs constitute $2,400 a month. Take $1,400 for rent, $300 for car insurance and gas, $300 for utilities, $200 for food ($50 a week). Try not to spend that remaining $50 a week in one place and forget about savings!” said a Reddit user.
A modern-day reflection on King’s campaign
In the final year of his life, King launched the Poor People’s Campaign, calling poverty a moral crisis created by policy choices, not personal failure.
That economic message feels particularly urgent in modern Houston. According to data from Apartment List and Zillow, average rents in the region have climbed dramatically over the past decade, outpacing wage growth for many workers.
The city’s median renter now spends a far higher share of income on housing than recommended by federal affordability standards.
Houstonians weigh in
For renters like Shaka Von Thomas, the increase has not been accompanied by improved living conditions. Thomas, 32, said he has watched his rent rise steadily over the past decade while services have declined.
“It’s been a very confusing situation,” Von Thomas said. “I’ve seen the prices go up, but the quality of service and different upkeep actually go down within the property. If you were staying in Houston 10 years ago, you would’ve been living in a very nice property that had an okay rent.”
Thomas currently pays nearly $1,300 for a one-bedroom apartment in Katy, an amount that would have been considered luxury pricing a decade ago.
That confusion reflects a broader national pattern. Federal Reserve data shows that real wages for low- and middle-income workers have failed to keep pace with housing inflation in most major metro areas. The U.S. Bureau of Labor Statistics data show that wages increased 1.4% from 2024 to 2025, far below housing price growth, leaving middle-class families squeezed, particularly in cities outside mid-sized.
King warned against precisely this imbalance, arguing that labor without living wages traps families in cycles of instability.
Houston historian Whitney Brantley, who rents in the Galleria area, said housing affordability has become a survival strategy rather than a guarantee. Brantley pays $1,454 for a two-bedroom, two-bath apartment she shares with her 11-year-old son, but only because she rents from a private owner in an older building.
“I usually stay in older places, like they were built in the seventies,” Brantley said. “That’s really all I live in, all bills paid.”
Do King’s words ring true?
King understood housing as inseparable from labor justice. During the Memphis sanitation strike, workers earned poverty wages while risking their lives on a daily basis. He framed their demands as moral, not radical: the right to fair pay for necessary work. Today, service workers, teachers, healthcare aides, and retail employees form the backbone of Houston’s economy, yet many struggle to afford the very city they sustain.
“When I first looked in 2022, I feel like $2000+ rents for a one bedroom in some of the more expensive Inner Loop neighborhoods like Upper Kirby, Montrose, and Museum District were a relatively rare exception (i.e. basically only at the Hanover Buildings and a couple of other high-end luxury apartments), with the usual range at $1500-$1700,” a Reddit user looked for answers online in October. “These days it seems like most of those same $1500-$1700 buildings are over $2000, often well over. Am I imagining this as an overall trend toward rent inflation, or is this a real trend? I know Houston overall is still a relatively affordable city, I think I was just surprised at how much some apartments had seen their rents go up.”
As King wrote in Where Do We Go from Here: Chaos or Community?, “We must create full employment, or we must create incomes.” The absence of either, he warned, would deepen inequality and erode democracy itself.
Is affordable rent a myth today?
In a city where rents continue to climb and wages lag, King’s message remains relevant. The question he posed in March 1968 still hangs over Houston today: Can a society truly claim justice while working people cannot afford a place to live?
“You are doing many things here in this struggle,” he said. “You are demanding that this city will respect the dignity of labor. So often we overlook the work and the significance of those who are not in professional jobs, of those who are not in the so-called big jobs. But let me say to you tonight, that whenever you are engaged in work that serves humanity and is for the building of humanity, it has dignity, and it has worth. One day our society must come to see this. One day our society will come to respect the sanitation worker if it is to survive, for the person who picks up our garbage, in the final analysis, is as significant as the physician, for if he doesn’t do his job, diseases are rampant. All labor has dignity.”
