All eyes will be on the Reserve Bank when it announces the Official Cash Rate this morning.

You could argue the interest rate will draw more attention than it deserves. But try telling that to a would-be first home buyer, or someone who has managed to buy, but is only just managing to meet enormous mortgage repayments.

As the housing crisis continues to spread outside of Auckland, each OCR announcement is met with breathless speculation. This time many believe it's a close call, with the bank once more forced to choose between house prices, or our economy more generally. There's an outside chance of a rate cut, but most economists expect it to hold steady. When caught between a rock and a hard place, keeping it at 2.25 percent avoids fanning the flames of house prices, while protecting our dollar from gaining any more value, and sending inflation skywards.

The expectation for the Reserve Bank to fix housing all by itself is somewhat unfair. The strongest tools to deal with the crisis are in the hands of the government.

That's not just the opinion of one journalist, it's also the overwhelming international consensus.

The Prime Minister is weighing up a land tax, but it's tricky, and could apply to expat New Zealanders as well. The OECD has repeatedly tried to convince different New Zealand governments to bring in a capital gains tax, but as Labour learned in 2014, voters will punish any party which brings up even a soft version of the policy.

Instead Labour's switched to pushing for a ban on foreign buyers. But the party happily ignores that policy would breach some of our free trade agreements, including the most controversial one, the Trans-Pacific Partnership.

The next biggest tool the government could reach for is fixing negative gearing. Put simply, landlords are currently protected from making a loss on investment properties, because they can claim it back as a tax break. As recently as February the International Monetary Fund warned New Zealand to move on the issue, saying it's pushing up house prices.

With so many options available, the pressure for the Reserve Bank to balance housing against the economy looks even more unfair. But until the government takes action on the problem, interest rates are all we have.